


Unknown Constellations

by Eustacia Vye (eustaciavye)



Category: Push (2009)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-05
Updated: 2009-11-04
Packaged: 2017-10-07 00:49:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 22,865
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/59564
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eustaciavye/pseuds/Eustacia%20Vye
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Nick was snatched up by Division, and Cassie finally Sees where he is. This sets into motion a whole chain of events she didn't See in the first place...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Meeting

By words, by voices, a lost way - ,  
And here above the chimney stack  
The unknown constellations sway -  
And by what way shall I go back?  
\- Archibald MacLeish, "L'An Trentiesme De Mon Eage"

Cassie sat at the bar and looked at the bartender. The red hair was as synthetic as the green eyes, but the rest of her was real enough. She wasn't one that believed in fantastic levels of augmentation, just enough to enhance her skills. "Whiskey and rye," she told the bartender, pushing a red snapper across the counter.

The redhead smirked and took the hundred dollar bill. "Somehow I don't think it's your speed. But hey, I don't make the rules around these parts."

"Maybe you could help me," Cassie said, watching the girl pour the drink. It had to go just so, or the girl would balk. She was a Runner, and she wasn't stupid.

"Oh? What with?" she asked, eyebrow raised. "I'm just a bartender."

"Nobody's _just_ anything in this place," Cassie told her, leaning in. She was sixteen tomorrow and she had lives to save.

"Maybe," the redhead replied, shrugging. "What's it to me?"

"More snappers. A lot more. Maybe some crackers, too," Cassie said, referring to the $10,000 bank note.

The bartender leaned over the bar. "And what's this help entail? Saving the world?" she asked, almost sneering at Cassie.

"There are people with abilities," Cassie told the bartender. "Special abilities, some of which are almost too fantastic to be real, and aren't paid for."

The bartender's gaze was hard. "You got something against cyberware?"

"It messes with what I do," Cassie told her sweetly. "You can have all the gear you like, but then I'm not worth even one snapper to certain circles."

The redhead straightened up. "Well. If you've got a job, I've got ears."

Cassie smiled. "Oh, I've got a job, all right. It's telling the story that takes a bit of time to get your brain around."

The redhead shook her head. "You're talking to a bartender, honey. I've heard all kinds of things." She stuck her hand out. "I'm Spire."

"Cassie," she said, shaking the bartender's hand. Spire wasn't that much older than her, but she had pulled enough jobs that her name had been bandied about on the street. She'd come to Hong Kong fairly recently, after something in Seattle had gone south and she was the only survivor. Bets were still out as to what it was, but triad damage was high on the list of possible problems. As far as Cassie was concerned, the rumor mill was fairly accurate.

"Stay a while," Spire told her, nodding to a quiet corner at the bar. "We close at two, and we can talk details then."

She smiled and scooted over into the dark corner. She got her pad and markers and began to draw. She liked it when things unfolded the way she Saw them, and it was happening with greater clarity more often than not. Cassie wasn't sure if she was going to approach her mother's gift, but it seemed that way more often now. If anything, this was all the more reason for her to act _now,_ before anyone caught wind of her increasing Watcher abilities. It was best that Division still thought her a weak child pretending at being grown up.

As the alcohol worked its way through her system, the images began to form. They were clear and detailed, and she began to sketch.

***

Cassie put her pen down as there was shouting at the bar. "LEXI!" someone screeched from the back room.

Spire reached beneath the bar and dove over the bar to race to the back before Cassie could even blink. The girl was _fast._ Cassie couldn't even register what she had in her hand. The rest of the denizens in the bar didn't bat an eyelash. People shrieked all the time in runner's bars. It was smoky and dark for a reason.

Cassie crept down the hallway and she heard three shots fired in quick succession. She ran and stopped short at the end of the hallway. Spire was standing there, gun in hand. A large burly man and two smaller men dressed in black were all dead, shot neatly between the eyes. A small Asian girl was sobbing on the floor between the crumpled bodies. Spire knelt down in front of the girl and tucked her gun in the waistband of her jeans at the small of her back. Cassie didn't understand what she was saying, but it sounded like Japanese. The girl responded in the same language, rubbing at her eyes and then throwing her arms around Spire, calling her Lexi-san.

Cassie stepped backward, aware she was intruding. Spire looked up sharply, whipping around while still cradling the girl in her arms. Cassie blinked when she realized the gun was pointed at her. She hadn't even seen Spire do it. "I heard shots," she said, holding her hands up.

"You didn't hear anything. Just some bottles falling and breaking," Spire told her in a matter of fact tone.

Cassie nodded. "Lexi?"

"My other name," Spire said. "If you're hiring, Spire's good enough."

Cassie nodded again and started stepping backward. "I'll just go sit back down, then."

Spire nodded at her, tucking the gun away again. "You do that. I'll meet you when the bar closes in an hour."

Had it really been that long while she was drawing? She supposed it was, and waited for the next hour, sipping at whatever drink Spire sent her way. She had gone through her drawings, and they were merely clearer versions of what she had drawn before she decided to do something about it. Spire was the wild card; she wasn't from Hong Kong, so she was likely something that would confuse the local Watchers long enough to get a head start.

Spire locked up the bar and sat down across from Cassie with a bottle of beer in hand. Her gun was tucked into her jacket, and looked like a very glossy, very expensive personalized weapon. Cassie didn't know enough about guns to know what kind it was just by looking at it.

"Wild night, huh?" Cassie asked with a smile, not sure where to begin.

Spire shrugged. "It happens on occasion. Some guys think little girls are easy pickings." She took a swig from the bottle. "So, what is it you'd like to hire me on for?"

"What do you know about people with special abilities?"

"You mean all that woo-woo stuff?" Spire shrugged. "Some. I know it exists, I know cyberware fucks with it and I know that shit can kill you and you can't see it coming. I prefer to deal with what I can see, myself."

Cassie nodded. "I'm a Watcher." She pulled out her notebook as Spire digested that fact. She'd heard that serious things had happened in Seattle that nobody wanted to talk about, and it seemed that Spire didn't want to talk about it either. Cassie could appreciate that, and it had nothing to do with the task at hand anyway. "A friend of mine got taken by Division. For a while I didn't See anything, but then yesterday I started to."

"So he was unconscious for how long?" Spire asked abruptly.

"I don't know if he was unconscious. I didn't See any specifics about that."

"What what I've heard, you guys can't See anything if someone's dead or out of it."

Cassie shook her head. "If there are no plans, no decisions made, sometimes that's enough to prevent it." Spire nodded her understanding, so Cassie took a breath and opened her book. The first picture was a sloppy sketch of a green eyed figure with red hair standing over three black figures. "I drew this yesterday. I didn't know what it meant until tonight, though. Sorry, I'm not a very good artist." Cassie flipped over the page. "This is when I knew I needed help."

Spire took the book and frowned at the picture. A rough figure was lying on a hospital bed in restraints with an IV drip in its arm. Beneath the sketch was the name Nick. "Your friend?" she asked, pushing the book back at Cassie.

Cassie nodded, a lump in her throat. "That's not an ordinary hospital. It's one of Division's intensive care wards."

Blowing out a breath. "So you want me to break into Division's ICU to retrieve your friend?"

Cassie flipped over the page. Nick was still in the hospital bed, but this time a rough figure with messy red hair and green x's for eyes was lying on the floor with a large red splotch over the chest. "Not a good idea."

Spire sighed and leaned back. "Never mind, I was interrupting. You continue."

"You're taking this awfully well."

"Met up with Division once," Spire said tightly. "Not pleasant, to put it mildly." Cassie looked at her wonderingly. "Before I got here, I had a friend of the woo-woo variety. He could just do things. I think they classified it as a Mimic." Cassie nodded and remained silent. "A lot of people died and he never got out." Spire folded her hands and looked at Cassie. "Let's just say I don't mind sticking it to Division much."

"I'd hoped that was the case." Cassie flipped over the picture. It looked like a tea shop in Hong Kong, though Cassie's sketch made it a little difficult to tell. "This is Auntie Wu's."

"I'd wondered," Spire told her dryly. "It's missing her good luck banner."

That was good that Spire recognized the place. Auntie Wu was technically one of those old fashioned Chinese apothecaries. She was also a pretty decent sniffer, and one of the few willing to work with outsiders after Emily Hu had abruptly left Hong Kong three years ago. While there had been no obvious backlash from Division, Emily Hu had prized her ability to be impartial. Cassie wasn't sure she knew where she had gone to, and it wasn't important. The gulf in services meant that Auntie Wu received all sniffing requests, and could afford to pick and choose which job she took.

Cassie flipped over the next picture and watched Spire's face. The picture was of a large woman, presumably Auntie Wu herself, holding a gun in one hand and a knife in the other. Spire was sitting in front of her, back facing them. Someone was sitting beside her, though the back of this person was also facing them. "Who's that?" she asked, pointing to the figure seated next to them.

"I don't know."

Spire frowned at it and pushed the picture back. "I haven't done a group job in a while." _Not since Seattle._

"I don't think I recruit this person," Cassie told Spire. She flipped the page and there was Auntie Wu with X's for eyes. "I don't think I get a chance to talk to Auntie Wu at all."

Spire took the book back and looked at that picture, then at the one before. There was no indication of time passing or how they moved from one photo to the next. "The drawing really sucks," she said, pushing the book back. "How long between the two pictures?"

"Ten minutes," Cassie told her, shrugging. "I can't help it. I'm a Watcher that can't draw."

"Go on, then. You still haven't got to the job yet, and I'm seeing a whole lot of negative so far."

Cassie flipped over the picture. There was Spire's head and the darker head facing away from them and toward Cassie. That blur was neatly labeled "me," and Spire flicked a glance at Cassie. They looked to be in this very same bar, a box in between them. "I don't know what's in the box, and I don't know who this is," she said, hitting the dark head. "I think it's a man, but I'm not sure." She flipped the page again and it was a picture of Tokyo. "But I think we wind up looking here for Nick."

"So why the head trip? Why show me all this?"

"Because I don't think we have a lot of time, and I'm not good with plans like this." Not to mention, the less she planned, the less likely another Watcher would pick her up. Spire was too new to be on the radar as a player in Hong Kong. She was good, but a stranger to the place. She wasn't worth considering as far as the older triad houses were concerned.

"You don't happen to know where in Tokyo, do you?" Spire looked at the book and flipped through the next few pages as Cassie shook her head. She froze at the next drawing and looked up sharply. "Do you always know what you're drawing?"

"No. The alcohol makes the Seeing sharper, but it also makes it harder for me to understand sometimes."

Spire frowned and looked at the drawings again. "Come back tomorrow with five thousand Hong Kong dollars. I'll make arrangements. I know why we go see Auntie Wu."

Cassie smiled and took her book back. The drawings hadn't made sense to her at the time, but apparently they hadn't been for her. "Thank you."

"Don't thank me yet," Spire told her, shaking her head. "You have no idea what it's going to take to get your friend out of that holding site and keep him out. That five thousand is just a down payment. You're paying all the expenses. I'll let you know how much more I'll need as we go, but I can tell you right now it's not going to be cheap."

Cassie shrugged, trying to keep her hope in check. As long as Nick got out of there in one piece, it was worth it. "Money is no object. We'll get it somehow. We just need Nick out of there."

***  
***


	2. Finding Things In A Hurry

Cassie arrived at closing and sat at the bar while Spire cleaned up and closed out the register. Her boss, a quiet man named Lu Chin, merely took the money and nodded at Spire, letting her lock up. Lu Chin nodded at Cassie, then left the building. "He doesn't care you meet people here?"

"It's that kind of bar," Spire replied with a shrug. "Got the money?"

Cassie shoved over a brown paper bag. Spire checked it briefly and then tucked the money into an inner pocket of the short jacket she wore over a skintight top that showed off her cleavage and the tight jeans and tall boots. The bullet casing necklace she had been wearing the other day was gone. "Are we going somewhere?" Cassie asked as Spire stared at her.

"You're too young," Spire decided finally, shaking her head. "And you're certainly not dressed right. We'll have to fix that."

Cassie let Spire bring her to some random part of town. Spire knocked on a door and smiled as a small opening in the door revealed a Chinese man with one brown eye and one milky blue one. "Chang. I have working papers to pick up."

"Lexi, Hwang owes you nothing."

"It's not a favor, it's a job."

Clearly frowning, Chang nodded. The opening slid shut and the door itself was opened. "Hwang needs the money," Chang intoned.

"Hwang always needs the money." Spire walked past Chang, missing the scowl on his face. Cassie gave him a wilted smile, and he only scowled deeper. Cassie kept close to Spire; she didn't know this part of Hong Kong and didn't know these people. She only knew the Watchers and Shadows, and the occasional Movers and Pushers and Screamers that crossed her path as she tried to stay alive. She wasn't sure if the reason she hadn't met so many of these people was Nick telling them to stay away from her.

Spire nodded at a skinny Chinese man in dirty black jeans and an unbuttoned white shirt with a smooth chest and a cigarette behind his ear. "Hwang, I have a job for you."

He smiled and looked up from the passport he had been working on. "Lexi, beautiful as ever," he said in accented English. "Are you ready to leave Hong Kong, then?"

"It's not for me," she said, shaking her head. She nodded at Cassie. "She needs to be legally nineteen."

"Nineteen?" Hwang asked. "This child can't pass for nineteen."

"She will when I'm done with her," Spire said, shrugging her shoulders. "But you know the Hanging Gardens."

Hwang laughed and pulled the cigarette out from behind his ear. "You are asking for trouble, Lexi."

Spire sat down in front of Hwang and pulled out a stack of bills from Cassie's five thousand dollars. She pushed the bills across Hwang's desk. "Just get us the passport, Hwang."

"You're lucky I like you," he said, closing his hand over hers.

Spire leaned back and removed her hand. "I still won't suck your cock, so just do the passport."

Hwang snarled at her but snatched up the money. He looked over at Cassie with an assessing gaze. "What name do we choose for her?"

"Use Kimberly Masters," Spire replied as Cassie opened her mouth to answer. "I have a _mei mei_ now."

Hwang snorted but nodded. "You're setting yourself up for something dangerous," he intoned, eying them both. "You're going to dig yourselves an early grave if you do this."

"Goes with the territory," Spire replied with a shrug.

Cassie looked between the both of them, but figured it was safer not to answer. The talk about Spire was that she had come to Hong Kong recently, maybe about a year or so ago, but she obviously knew enough of the underground already. She let Hwang do whatever it was that he needed to go to give her a passport that turned her into nineteen year old Kimberly Masters, and let Spire usher her back into her car. It looked a lot tougher on the inside than the outside. "Where are we going?" she asked, brows knit in confusion.

"You're being Watched," Spire replied, not looking away from the street. "Still, it can't be helped. Most main players are these days."

Cassie blinked. She had really hoped that she hadn't been. "And in there...?"

"Chang is a Shadow. So they don't know your new name yet, and I'm not big enough to ping on anybody's radar. I've done babysitting jobs, fencing shit, guard duty. Nothing big here."

_Here._ Cassie wondered what happened in Seattle and why it was that she Saw the necessity of using Spire instead of someone else.

They pulled up in front of a dingy high rise building. Cassie followed Spire up to an apartment on the fourteenth floor. Once there, Spire wordlessly began to rifle through the closet. "I think we're about the same size," Spire told her, coming back with a few items. "Where we're going, the little girl routine won't help you. You need to look like a job hunter."

Cassie kept her mouth shut and let Spire dress her in a skimpy outfit and put on heavy makeup. "Just remember, you answer to _mei mei,"_ Spire told her. "And call me Lexi." Cassie nodded. Wherever they were going, she knew nothing about it. It was likely safer that way.

Spire drove in a twisting route that confused Cassie. They finally pulled up in front of a building with the pulsing bass beat thumping through the walls. Though it was nearly four in the morning, there was a long line waiting to get into the place. "It never closes," Spire told her, catching her dumbfounded look. "It's that kind of a place."

Cassie followed closely as Spire headed straight to the bouncer with a smile on her face. "Brian! Long time no see!"

The bouncer was tall and built like a brick wall. Spire was a tiny thing next to him, but he lit up at the sight of her. "Lexi, honey, it's been ages. I thought you might've bounced after all."

Spire shrugged. "You know how it is, working a job. Can't always swing by to say hello." She hugged Brian and slid a few bills into his back pocket. "Think I could avoid the scanner?"

"Honey..." he began, shaking his head. "You know how it goes..."

"Think of that as a down payment," she said, lip curling into a sensual smile. "Come by the bar at closing and take me home. Chen knows my schedule better than I do these days."

He laughed and nodded. "I miss Seattle."

Something in her face froze, though Cassie only caught it because she had been watching closely. "Yeah. Good times, then."

Brian touched his ear piece and said something in rapid fire Japanese. "They're expecting you out back, Lex."

Spire stood on her tip toes and pressed a kiss to his cheek. "You're a wonderful man, Brian. You're wasted on this place."

He laughed as they went around to the back. "You knew him from before?"

"Weren't a lot of places to go when Seattle went belly up," Spire replied, voice hard and tight. "He'd been here before, helped me find some stuff to work my way in around here. We're friends."

Cassie kept her mouth shut. Better not to know, better not to ask.

They entered the club, and Cassie had to admit that Spire had been right. Dressed as she normally did, she would have stuck out. Spire headed straight for the back room and rapped on a door that held both Cantonese and kanji symbols. It opened, and they went inside. Four heavily armed men stood there, two on each side of the room. There was a long desk with piles of various kinds of money. A middle aged Japanese woman sat there, not stopping in her counting. Cassie and Spire waited patiently until she had made a notation in her ledger and pushed the money into a different pile. A young man at her left took the piles on her left side away with a bow and exited the room through a door on the left side of the room that Cassie hadn't noticed before.

The woman finally looked up. "Lexi, my dear, I had hoped to never see you again."

Spire nodded and remained silent otherwise. Her stance was tense and her face serious. Cassie merely looked between them, confused.

"I suppose you want your object back," the woman said with a sigh.

"Please," Spire replied, nodding.

"It won't bring them back." The woman's voice was gentle, which only served to confuse Cassie even further. She stood and opened the safe in the wall behind her. She removed a small item that was wrapped in a piece of purple velvet cloth. She went around the desk and pushed the item into Spire's hands. "Nothing will bring them back."

"I know. But maybe it's time to make the bastards pay for what they've done."

The woman nodded slowly. "It's been long enough that they may not expect it."

Spire smiled for the first time since entering the club, but it was a sinister one. "That's what I'm hoping for, Obasan," Spire said.

The woman laughed and shook her head. "Ah, then. If you bring me a trinket back, I will not object. If you bring access to much wealth, I will elevate your name."

"The usual, then," Spire replied with a nod. "If I come back."

"If you come back," the woman agreed. "You are certainly no use to me dead."

Spire nodded and bowed deeply. Cassie copied her move and followed Spire out of the room. "Lexi?"

"Not here. Her Shadow isn't that good."

Cassie shut her mouth and nodded. Of course Spire would go to the places with Shadows. She had already mentioned she knew Cassie was being Watched. Spire knew an awful lot about an awful lot of things, Cassie was discovering. Nick had known that the way to defeat a Watcher was to simply not plan ahead. Since Spire wasn't on anyone's radar and Cassie was simply following her around, not planning anything, her Watchers were likely still coming up blank. This was good.

Cassie shut her eyes as they drove to the next location. Whatever Spire had planned, it was best if they didn't know about it.

But the next stop was Auntie Wu's. And the protection talisman was missing from the door.

Spire nodded at the front guard. "I have an appointment with Auntie."

"She is in negotiations," the guard said, looking uncomfortable.

"Yes, but I have an appointment. Auntie Wu always keeps those, negotiations or no." Spire replied. This was true, and the guard had to let them pass to enter the establishment.

***  
***


	3. Visions of Company

They entered the back room, and Cassie saw Auntie Wu seated at her massive mahogany desk in a black and silver cheong sam. It was like the vision she had Seen, complete with the dark haired figure seated at the desk in front of her. Now she could see it was a Japanese man in a black suit facing Auntie Wu, his back to them as they entered the room. "We have an appointment with the gracious and generous Auntie Wu," Spire began in accented Cantonese.

The man turned around, glaring at Spire. She hadn't noticed him yet.

Auntie Wu winced and waved at them. "Speak English. Your accent is terrible."

"My apologies, Auntie," Spire said, coming to sit in front of the desk. "I tried to learn the greeting properly."

"We have a discussion!" the man hissed at Auntie Wu angrily. Spire stiffened at the sound of his voice but remained silent. Cassie sat down beside Spire and kept her mouth shut.

"Your item?" Auntie Wu asked Spire after shooting the man a quelling glance. Spire pushed the velvet covered item across the desk, not making a move to undo it. "What are you looking for, then?"

"Is this the proper time to use this?" she asked, voice quiet. The man stared at her, but Spire sat stiffly, ignoring him.

Auntie Wu uncovered the item, a small silver puzzle box covered in kanji. She removed her black leather gloves and picked it up. The Japanese man stiffened at the sight of the box. Auntie Wu brought it to her nose and inhaled deeply. She froze and looked at Spire sharply. "You are a walking dead girl," Auntie Wu hissed at her, dropping the puzzle box back onto the cloth. She hastily recovered her hands. "You brought this into my house!"

"Is that a yes?" Spire asked calmly.

"How did you get that?" the Japanese man asked, hand at his waist.

Auntie Wu looked between the three people seated in front of her and began to smile. "I see. I see." She covered the puzzle box and slid the wrapped item back toward Spire. "I have something for the both of you, then. I did not know why I was charged with this task, but now I understand. Watchers, they have plans within plans. I understand this now."

She left the room, leaving a confused group of people seated in front of her desk. Spire took the puzzle box back, but the man's hand clamped down over hers. "Lexi Masters," he said, voice low and sinister. "You should have stayed dead."

"Hideki. Remove your hand from mine or I'll remove it for you."

"You're just a synth," he said, moving to grasp her neck with his other hand. "I can kill you right now."

"I'm a synthetic Runner," Spire said evenly. "You try to choke me and you'll have a bullet in your heart before you can blink. Do you really think it matters once you're dead if I'm synthetic or not?"

Suddenly the cyberware of the world seemed a lot more sinister. Division had people with abilities working for them, as did the underground families. But if cyberware could accurately copy these abilities, that meant the playing field just got a whole lot more dangerous for everyone.

Hideki curled his lip at her but let go of her and let her keep the puzzle box. "You have Omiro property."

"This came from the Mimotech vault," she told him, face carefully blank.

Cassie suddenly realized exactly why she had Seen Spire in her alcoholic visions.

"You lie. The Omiro do not deal with Mimotech," Hideki hissed at Spire.

"Taka did," Spire hissed back, face contorting with anger. "You know full well he did, Hideki. Taka was a sick bastard and did whatever the fuck he liked. That's why I walked when I did."

Hideki stood up abruptly and began to pace, agitated. "Takahashi has always been law unto himself, but even he would not run counter to Father..." He trailed off as if he was remembering something. "Well, not often." He turned and faced Spire. "And Mimotech?"

"You heard about Seattle."

Hideki nodded and Cassie couldn't help but wonder who the hell was talking about it, because _she_ hadn't heard a damn thing about it. "More than half of the family disappeared and most of our workforce vanished."

"We were supposed to do a data dump from Mimotech's offline server," Spire said, voice tight and angry. "But it wasn't just hacking a corp. Mimotech is one of Division's corp fronts. We were trying to hack _Division."_

Cassie's blood ran cold, even though she had recognized the name Mimotech. It was the source of the drugs that kept her mother under lock and key at Division Headquarters. It was no wonder so many people died.

"And yet you survived," Hideki sneered. "You ran like a coward, didn't you?"

Spire stiffened but didn't respond. Her hand was tight around the puzzle box in her coat pocket. Before she could answer, Auntie Wu returned with the box from Cassie's vision. She placed it on the table. "This was given to me some time ago. And now that I can release it, I can be released."

Spire and Hideki were too busy glaring at each other. "I think you need to open the box," Cassie reminded them.

Closer to it, Spire opened the box. Inside was a richly decorated urn. She backed away from it, eyes wide with shock. Hideki came closer, a sneer on his face that gave way to dismay. "And to think he was trying to make you his Princess," Hideki said, looking at Spire with a curled lip.

"Fuck you, Hideki," Spire hissed, spinning around. "I'm done here."

"You need to look in the box," Cassie told her, holding out her hands to stop her from moving. One of her other sketches had Spire holding the box, and right now she was making no move to pick it up.

But Hideki was the one looking into the box, taking out an envelope with kanji on the front of it. "Who left this with you, Auntie Wu?"

"A Watcher that didn't leave her name. She broke out of Division briefly, and let herself be caught." Was it just Cassie's imagination, or did Auntie Wu stare straight at her with those words? Auntie Wu sat back down in her chair heavily. "So tonight it begins." She smiled at the three of them. "I'm glad it comes to this, then. It's been some time in waiting."

Hideki was reading the letter and held it out to Spire, hand trembling. "Read this!" he commanded.

She shot him a look that clearly indicated she wanted nothing to do with him, but took the letter and read it anyway. "Stupid bastard," she whispered, shaking her head. "Stupid, stupid bastard. I _told_ him it wouldn't work. I _told_ him."

"So now I must present this to Father and the head of the Omiro clan," Hideki said, shutting the box and taking it under his arm. "I will remember this, Auntie Wu."

"Soon there will be nothing to remember."

Spire had seen Cassie's drawing and wasn't surprised by the statement. Hideki kept looking at her as if she was a puzzle to solve.

Shots outside startled them all. Spire glared at Hideki, but he shook his head sharply. "Not my men. They wouldn't shoot."

"Of course not," Spire sneered. "Knife work."

Auntie Wu nodded at them. "The back entrance will let you out safely. My Watcher friend guaranteed me this much. Go!"

Spire caught hold of Cassie after stuffing the letter into her pocket. She sprinted out of the back entrance, but not so fast that Cassie couldn't follow. Hideki had the box with the urn and followed her. "You! This is your fault!" he shouted at her.

"Fuck you, Hideki!" Spire spat. She found her car and hit the alarm. "Get in!" she shouted at Cassie, who did just that. Hideki reached them before Spire could throw the car in gear and jumped into the backseat. "Get the fuck out!"

"For Taka's sake," he said coldly, staring her down. "You will drive me out of here."

Spire's mouth slammed shut and she turned around. "Buckle up and hang on. I see the Genzou family across the street."

Cassie could barely make out the leather jackets of the Genzou enforcers in the darkness but trusted Spire. She had synthetic eyes, and Cassie had never asked what they were for. She hung on as Spire navigated the busy streets, doubling back on her route several times. Cassie had no idea where they were when Spire finally stopped. "Get out," she told Hideki.

"You loved him, didn't you?" he asked her quietly. "Then why betray him?"

"For fuck's sake, Hideki! I'm not stupid! There are two perfectly good reasons. One, Taka was a sick bastard. Two, I'm _gaijin._ I'm not so deluded to think that Omiro-sama would _ever_ accept that." She shook her head at Hideki. "He had to leave me. I just forced his hand a little, that's all. I didn't think he would do _that!"_ she said, pointing toward the box in Hideki's hands.

"Can I ask a question?" Cassie interrupted, looking between the two. "What the hell are you talking about?"

Affronted, Hideki couldn't answer. Spire sighed and nodded at Hideki. "Yakuza. Hideki Omiro, First Son of the Omiro clan and elder brother of the late Enforcer Takahashi Omiro." She rubbed her temples. "He enjoyed his work a little too much, Hideki, you know that. I couldn't take it. I don't want to kill up close and personal, and certainly not by inches like he liked to do."

"Then why are you still alive if you betrayed him?" Cassie asked, confused. "They don't work that way."

"It wasn't anything serious. I stopped going to lessons and did jobs instead. He hated guns, couldn't understand why I liked them so much." Spire sighed and looked at Hideki. "Just get out, will you? I did as you asked and had nothing to do with Yakuza ever again."

_"Baka!_ He was trying to make you Princess," Hideki snarled.

"It wouldn't have worked," Spire replied. "Just get out. I have a job to do."

"Like Seattle?" Hideki sneered. "Give me that puzzle box!"

"It's mine now," she countered, shaking her head. "I need the key and the drive." Cassie hadn't even seen Hideki move to get his knife when Spire drew out her gun and pointed it at Hideki's head. "He gave me the puzzle box, Hideki. It's all I have left of him."

"It wasn't his to give. It belongs to the Omiro."

"Then we have a problem, don't we?" she asked him sweetly, pulling back the safety. "Because I need the box, and you're not getting it back."

"You can't open it," he snarled, helpless. Spire simply shrugged, but didn't move or answer. "If I open it for you," he began slowly, "then you can keep whatever is inside of it and I will take the box."

"Then I'll need Omiro resources, won't I? Because you're not getting the box until my job is done, and I'm fairly certain you won't let me out of your sight until you get the box."

Hideki snarled and cursed under his breath. "Very well."

Spire pushed the safety back in place and put her gun away. "In that case, both of you come on up. We have to get the hell out of Hong Kong tonight, before the Watchers find us."

***

They were sitting in the bar where Cassie first met Spire, staring at the box containing the urn with Takahashi Omiro's ashes. Hideki had arranged for a flight out of Hong Kong bound for Tokyo, and they still had an hour's wait before they could be at the airport. "Why did you bring her along?" Hideki asked, looking at Cassie. "Wouldn't it have been too dangerous?"

"She needed a passport. And it's not like I have a safe house here."

Cassie dug into her bag for her notebook and pens. Hideki frowned at her, and Spire tried to stop her. At this point, Cassie didn't care if Hideki knew she was a Watcher or not, she needed to draw. She shook off Spire's hands and opened her notebook to the first blank page. She sketched quickly, with broad strokes that made it even harder to interpret what she was trying to draw. Still, she knew what she was Seeing.

"That's our jet," Hideki was saying, surprised. "But..."

But it was riddled with bullet holes, and there were circles with X's for eyes at the windows.

"Change of plan, then." Spire rubbed at her face tiredly. This was why she had wanted Cassie with her; in case something happened, the drawings would serve as warnings.

"You should have used what you had to buy more connections," Hideki told her angrily. "Why would you sit on something so dangerous and not use it? Why now?"

It was easier to start over if everyone thought she was dead. It was easier if most people didn't know she was a Synthetic. If word got out, she would be on a slab in Division's research department, trying to see why it had worked on her and not on any of their goons that volunteered for it and died on the table. The Yakuza knew because Taka knew, and some of the triads knew. But all of them didn't want to deal with Division. They had their own specials, and neither side liked sharing. Limited cyberware was around the bigger cities like Hong Kong and Tokyo, but it was usually obvious and for effect. Most cyberware that Division was interested in was exorbitantly expensive and fantastically lethal if done incorrectly. Mimotech had been one of Division's largest research and development front companies, mostly with pharmaceuticals and the like. Spire could still remember the extensive morgue in its basement, however. Mimotech hadn't minded experimentation on willing and unwilling volunteers to try to mimic the specials' natural abilities, even if they failed miserably. The best of their experiments had only a tiny fraction of the weakest specials' abilities. It was a far cry to getting everyone in Division to be a special.

But Spire wasn't about to say all this to Hideki. "They would have found me," she said simply. "Then I would be dead, they would have the box, and they would win."

"Well, now we have no way out of Hong Kong."

"There's the way I would have taken with her," Spire said softly. "You won't like it."

He indeed did not like it. In the cargo hold of a ship bound for Tokyo, Hideki fumed. To make up for it, Cassie passed Hideki a drawing. "What is this?"

"Tomorrow's lottery numbers," Cassie replied. "It might help a little." It was how she got around Hong Kong. She made sure never to win too much, but just enough to get by for a bit, just enough to try to find out where Nick was being held. Division had kept him for five months, and she had only just gotten a sense of him in the past few days. She didn't want to think about what they might have done in five months' time, or how twisted his memories might be.

The first thing she was going to do when she saw him again would be to hug him. The next would be to kick him in the shins for giving himself up to let her get away. They were supposed to be trying to get her mother out of Division's clutches and find out what happened to Kira. They had last heard from her almost a year and a half ago, after she had told Nick that she was planning on taking out Carver's replacement. Considering that replacement had files on all of them, Nick had argued with her that it wasn't safe. But she was in the US and Nick had been in Hong Kong, so it was difficult for Nick to enforce anything. It had turned out to be their last conversation.

Hideki wasn't much of a conversationalist, but he did accept the lottery numbers. Cassie made her way to Spire, who was sitting on one of the boxes and rereading the letter that had been in with Takahashi's urn. "Spire?" She didn't respond, absorbed in the letter. "Lexi?"

Her head shot up, and she looked around, confused. Then her eyes refocused on Cassie. "Oh. Yeah. Sorry about that."

Cassie pulled herself up to sit beside Spire. She couldn't read the kanji. "He was special?"

Spire shook her head and refolded the letter, placing it into her inside coat pocket. "Nope. Just fond of knives and a sick sense of humor."

_I meant special to you,_ but Cassie didn't say it. She didn't know Spire well enough for that. "Did you have a little sister?" she asked, thinking of the passport in her pocket.

"I was one, once. But then, I was the accident no one wanted and no one knew what to do with," she said, shrugging. If she regretted saying anything, her face didn't show it. "It might be nice to have a little sister."

"Why are you helping me like this? It's more than money. If it was just money, you could have left me at the bar. You wouldn't have gotten me a passport or call me little sister or take me with you to Tokyo."

Spire sighed and looked away. "I ran with a Watcher once." That it was the Seattle job went unsaid. "A bunch of us, doing the shit no triad wanted to do. Nobody important enough or talented enough to get Division's notice. She wasn't good enough to be captured, wasn't good enough to really participate in a lot of the preplanning. But sometimes she had a shine to her, and she Saw things that curled a lot of hair." She looked back at Cassie. "She told my friend, the Mimic? She told him that he would die in a hail of bullets, and nothing we did would change it. She told me that I had to help a Watcher with multicolored hair in some bar she didn't recognize." Cassie merely stared at Spire. "So the fact that you want to bust somebody out of Division is just a bonus."

Cassie stared at her, at her eyes. "They look almost real," Cassie murmured. "Is that why Division never got a hold of you?"

Spire shrugged. "I've never been special enough for notice from anybody." At Cassie's incredulous look, she shrugged again. "What? My parents were Division Agents. You'd think they would've known. But they never noticed when I got my eyes done. I was fourteen at the time. They're off the books and done by an ex-Division doc using Division money. But no, never noticed. So I got my reflexes done when I was fifteen. Still didn't notice. I don't know if they even noticed when I took off a few months later."

"How did you get into this, then?"

"What else can you do? Skills like these won't get you an office job. And once you're in the underground for a while, it's really hard to go back to something legit." Spire shrugged. "Once you walk this path, you're kind of stuck. It's too hard to try to blend in with the normals after you've already seen what there is under the surface."

Cassie blinked, suddenly seeing a knife against Spire's throat, a hand pulling on her red hair. But then the vision was gone, and she wasn't sure what she had just Seen. "I've been on my own a while."

"Well, once we get your friend back, you won't be alone," Spire said. There was an air of finality in her tone that told Cassie she was done sharing for the moment. "The hard part will be staying off the Division grid, since this will _definitely_ get you back on it."

Nick could figure that part out. He was very good at figuring these things out, once he put his mind to it. They'd managed to stay off the grid for the past few years, and that included their aborted attempt at trading the drug for Cassie's mother and Kira's whereabouts. No one seemed to know what happened to Kira after Carver took her from Hong Kong, but Carver was no longer around either. Nick liked to think that Carver was dead, but then it had worried him about Kira. Why hadn't she contacted them? He'd been to Coney Island a few times, had sent feelers out across America. But she didn't respond to any of them, and there were no tracks to find. The new Agent they had dealt with for the information trade had dangled Cassie's mother in exchange for the enhancement drug. The drug was gone, and Cassie's mother was still with Division. Everyone got screwed in that deal, it seemed.

***  
***


	4. Tokyo Time

They landed in Tokyo without much fuss, and Hideki went to deliver the urn to the Omiro clan. Spire took Cassie with her to a noodle shop in a rundown corner of the city. "C'mon. I know a black market exchange around here."

"How do you know all these places?"

"People tell bartenders things," Spire told her with a shrug. "Let's get a decent meal and figure out where the next step takes us. I know the building your friend is in, and it's zipped tight. I don't know if I know anybody in Tokyo anymore."

"Hideki..."

"Doesn't give a flying fuck about this job," she said abruptly. "He got what he wanted and he'll wait for the puzzle box. That's it."

Cassie kept her mouth shut, even though she itched to sketch the place where Hideki would meet up with them again. He wanted the puzzle box, and he didn't trust Spire to give it back gracefully.

They zig zagged through a bunch of different noodle shops and mini bars, Spire speaking in rapid Japanese. Cassie had never really learned anything other than English. Maybe a smattering of curse words, though that didn't count for much. They finally tumbled into a mostly empty minibar that was willing to exchange money for Spire. It was at this bar that Hideki walked in, visibly angry. He sat down beside Spire, gun obvious beneath his suit jacket. The bartender looked up sharply, then looked away. Interfering with Yakuza was bad for his health, let alone his business. "You still have my box, and I want it now."

Cassie shot Spire an "I told you so" look that she ignored. "I haven't done my job yet."

The bartender beat a hasty retreat when Hideki's palm hit the counter in anger. _"Baka!_ You know who I am, what I can do." When Spire didn't reply, he snatched her drink from her hand and tossed it onto the counter. "You speak to me when you are spoken to!"

As fast as her altered reflexes would allow, Spire grasped his wrist and bent it backward. "What do you want, Hideki? I told you I'd give it to you once the job is done. We haven't finished yet."

His hand shot out and he grasped her by the throat. "Father wants it _now."_

Not sure what she should do, Cassie came up in between them. "Maybe if you work together, this could happen faster? Nick can't get himself out right now."

Disgusted, Hideki let go of Spire and she reluctantly let go of him. "Where is this man you seek?"

"Mimotech," Spire said as Cassie took out her notebook to show him the drawing. "It's a Division grab."

He swore up a blue streak in Japanese and pushed away from the bar. "You are suicidal, Lexi."

"You want your box? Then I need the drive inside of it copied and put into safe keeping, and I need a way into the Mimotech building."

"Takeda has that district."

Spire didn't move. "Yeah. I need a way into the Mimotech building."

"Give me the box."

Cassie groaned as the two continued to stare each other down. She slapped her notebook down between them. "Who's that, then?" she asked, pointing at one of the pictures she had drawn. Hideki glanced at it. "One of our hackers."

"Then let's go," she said, poking Spire in the arm. "You two can hate each other later."

Still glaring at each other, they left the minibar for the hacker Hideki had recognized from Cassie's drawing. It was in the basement of a restaurant in one of the busier districts of Tokyo. Cassie would have gotten lost in all of the winding hallways if she hadn't Seen the way through already. Spire was looking around as if trying to memorize the way back out. Once they were seated in the hacker's domain, Hideki imperiously held out his hand for the puzzle box. With a sigh, Spire handed it over. Hideki pressed various symbols in an order only he knew, and the top of the box popped open. He retrieved a key card and a flash drive from inside the box.

He held onto them for a moment, then stared at Spire. "And you held onto this for a year?"

"Do you honestly think I could have survived a trade that soon after what happened?"

He curled his lip in disdain at her, but didn't reply. They both knew she couldn't have done it alone. Maybe if she had been on better terms with the Omiro, but she had cut ties years before that. Hideki ordered his man to copy the drive. It was understood that he would have his own copy, just in case he had to deal with Division. There was no sense in not benefiting from dealing with Spire.

Spire retrieved the key card and flash drive, shoving them into one of her interior coat pockets. She held three copies in her palm. "I'm sure it'll take time to arrange entry into the building."

He bristled at the implication he wouldn't follow through on his part of the bargain. "You'll get in. I'll find you in three hours."

Spire shook her head. "I don't know where I'll be. Should I wait outside the Omiro complex?"

"Fine. Three hours."

Cassie had to lead them out; Spire confused two hallways and got lost in the maze beneath the restaurant. "He really doesn't like you."

"He blames me for what happened with Taka," she said, shrugging. "Not that he liked me much before."

"Do you think we'll get Nick out?"

"Sure. I'm sure they'll want their research back."

"Research?"

"Some R-16 thing," Spire said, shrugging. "I never knew what we were going in to get. I was the point guy."

Cassie stopped cold. "We can't give this back to them! Do you even know what that is?"

"No, but it's all I've got to get your friend back. Now, c'mon, we have to get these copies stowed somewhere safe."

"Why?" she asked, refusing to budge. "I'd never sell it back to Division."

"That's your choice, then. But it's at least insurance so you're not killed outright. Now, c'mon, we have three hours."

Unwillingly, Cassie let Spire drag her along.

***

The last words of the Watcher in Seattle had been to protect a Watcher with multicolored hair in a strange bar, or else it would all happen again, more people would die in a rain of bullets. Spire almost wished she had forgotten about it, but she never had. She used her three hours to mail out the three copies of the flash drive overnight to Hong Kong, Seattle and LA. They were placed into neatly razored pockets within manga, a letter on top in carefully printed kanji. Spire then shoved a Hong Kong address at Cassie. "Keep this until you memorize it. That's Midori, the woman at the club I took you to. When you get out of here with your friend, you find Midori."

"Why are you giving me this?" Cassie asked, concerned.

But she didn't want to talk about her dead friend's last words, the scream of "Run!" still haunting her nightmares. "We have to go," she said instead, and then they were headed to the Omiro complex. Hideki was waiting for them, a disdainful curl to his lip. "We're on time," Spire told him. He didn't ask how she spent her three hours or where the copies of the flash drive had gone. She didn't volunteer the information.

The Mimotech building was in the middle of a brightly lit district. Hideki led the way into the building, and the streets were eerily empty, even for being ten o'clock at night. Tokyo was a bustling city, but the streets in this district were much too empty. He stopped at a conference room with four armed guards outside. Cassie could only make out "Omiro Hideki" amongst the Japanese, and let Hideki lead the way into the conference room. Four Japanese men dressed in black suits and brightly colored ties stood there, waiting. Hideki did all the talking, and Cassie felt as if this was all going to go very, very wrong. That sense of a knife against Spire's throat was back, the flash of blood on a blade. It wasn't a full vision yet, but she knew she had Seen it before.

The man in the center with the yellow tie was apparently Tanaka. Cassie couldn't tell what his job was with the Takeda clan, but he was the important one in the room. Spire stiffened when he talked, and said something that involved the words _mei mei._

And she could see Spire, wrists tied down to a gurney that was little more than a slab. She was beaten and bruised, hair wild and tangled. She hadn't gone down without a fight, but she had still gone down. The knife was at her throat, and Tanaka was there, grinning at her. There was fear and hatred and desperation, and Spire spat at Tanaka. He blotted at his face with his yellow tie, then moved the knife from her throat to her face. "You've made it easy for me," he told her, a grin splitting his face in two.

And then Cassie blinked as Spire was crouching slightly in front of her. "Hey. You have to go to the thirtieth floor."

"Where are you going to be?"

"Out," Spire lied.

Cassie's mouth ran dry. "You can't."

"Done. I was sold out before I even walked in here. C'mon, _mei mei._ Gimme a hug before you go get your friend." She held out her arms, and Cassie pressed herself into them. "Don't flinch," Spire whispered fiercely, and Cassie could feel the press of Spire's gun being jammed down the back of her jeans underneath the oversized coat she wore. Cassie reached into Spire's coat and found the key card and flash drive in one of her inside pockets. "Good girl," she murmured, nodding as she pulled back. "Thirtieth floor," Spire repeated with a nod. "Get them _all_ out. Then for God's sake, _run."_

"What about you?" Cassie asked as one of the men, one with a red tie, grasped Spire's arm.

"I'll find a way out," Spire told her confidently. They both knew she was lying.

Hideki and Tanaka said something else, rapid fire Japanese that simply set Spire's jaw tighter than it already was. Tanaka laughed and gestured for his men to leave. Hideki tried to take Cassie's arm, but she shrugged off the man. "Don't touch me," she hissed at Hideki.

An older Japanese man was striking Hideki across the face in front of an entire contingent of men. Shamed, Hideki only nodded and bowed deeply before the older man. "Father, I will retrieve what is ours. I will make peace with the Takeda. I will give them a business opportunity."

"See that you do," Hideki's father said, voice cold. "Or else I have no sons."

Hideki was staring at Cassie as if she were the biggest fool he had ever known. "I'm the reason you're alive, little girl. Now, let's go."

"I have somewhere to be," Cassie snapped. "Your honor's been restored, so now you have somewhere to be!"

He paled and backed up a step. It was enough to set Cassie running for the doors, past the armed guards and toward the elevator banks. There was shouting behind her in Japanese as she stabbed at the buttons with her finger, but no shots. The entire ride up to the thirtieth floor, she thought that maybe it would stop. Maybe it would jerk and fall, cables cut. Maybe someone would fall onto the roof, shoot down into the car.

It didn't happen.

The doors slid open on the thirtieth floor. There was a small vestibule, and a set of magnetic double doors that required a key card to enter. Cassie felt a chill as she slid the key card into the slot. The red light turned green. "Good evening Doctor Franks," a computerized voice said cheerfully. "You have alpha level clearance for this facility."

Alpha level. Now that was impressive.

Cassie stepped into Mimotech's research division in Tokyo, knowing she was walking into Division territory. She had known this for three hours. It was impossible for Mimotech's pet Watchers not to know this, not to know she was coming with a key card and the intention to free Nick. Only, now it was changing. Now she was going to do as Spire asked and let them all go, once she knew where they were.

Video security was everywhere. She had known that, too. She was about to be put back on the grid.

She walked up to the first security guard she saw, the only one there so late at night. Only authorized staff was allowed in this building, let alone this late. There was no need for more security guards. Cassie smiled sweetly at him, her little girl lost routine. "I'm looking for the live specimen storage," she said.

He frowned at her. "How did you-?"

Cassie held Spire's gun in front of her, before she had even thought she would use it. "Live specimen storage. Now."

The guard led the way. Cassie held him at gunpoint, her hand steady. She would shoot him if she had to. She was too close to Nick, too close to maybe finding out if they kept her mother here, or at some other facility. Division was too large and monstrous for one place, too networked with other governmental agencies. But maybe someone knew something, maybe there was a lead that could get her somewhere.

Once through the next checkpoint, Cassie cuffed the guard to a desk, took his gun and keys and dismantled the intercom and phone. She looked at him with an expression she had seen on Spire's face. "Stay there. Don't make me shoot you if I don't have to." The guard simply nodded, terrified.

Most of the halls were empty. She used the key card to open every door she found. She was on edge; Division had lead time on her arrival. Had they removed everyone? Was this simply an elaborate trap to get her back? Did they know how much better she had become in the past three years since she had dealt with Carver?

And then she saw him, just as she had Seen him before. Nick was lying on a hospital bed, IV's connected to his arms, unknown substances dripping down into them. Cassie rushed in and disconnected the monitors and drips. "Nick!" she cried, shaking him, Spire's gun on his lap. "Nick, wake up! We have to get out of here!" He made a groaning noise, as if waking from a deep sleep, and Cassie could see that one of the drips had been labeled Versed. She remembered Nick dealing it once in Hong Kong to make ends meet. Short acting sedative, something that blunted powers. "Nick, get your ass moving. I don't know how long we have."

Cassie grabbed the gun with one hand and Nick's arm with the other. She pulled him off of the bed and he stumbled, clutching at her for balance. He wasn't quite conscious yet, but knew that she was safe. He always knew that she was safe.

She opened every other room she found with the keycard and dismantled the drips and monitors on every other person she found. As Nick woke up, he began to Move the connections for her faster than she could undo them. Her hands were shaking. Division must be coming. Carver's replacement would find them, would lock them down like they did with Nick. This was all a tease, something to make them think they could get out of this...

People stumbled down the hallways, catching some, letting others fall. "We have to get out of here," Cassie hissed to Nick, pulling him along. "There's no way Division will let us go so easily. They have to know. There has to be someone that knows..."

But they made it back to the main entrance, and the key card let them back out. She hadn't even needed to barter the drive...

And the doors slid open, revealing the Agents Cassie had been afraid of. Nick was better, but still somewhat groggy. The others behind them weren't any better. _Fuck._

"You didn't think you were really going to escape, did you?" a tall woman in a black suit said. She smiled, her face crinkling into a mask that somehow didn't seem anywhere near as friendly as she wanted to seem. Her dark hair was cut much like Kira's had been, but Cassie hadn't seen Kira since that night in Hong Kong when Division took her back and they had the R-16 sample. As far as she could tell, both were lost forever. She hadn't Seen Kira since then, either.

"I like plans with no planning," Nick grumbled, and then Moved them into the wall. The brunette simply stood her ground; perhaps she was a Mover, too? They had never gotten a handle on who she was or what she could do. She had simply shown up two years ago and tried to take them in, dangling Cassie's mother in front of them.

"Try harder, Nicky," she said in a taunting tone. "You're just no good us the way you are."

"I have information," Cassie piped up, hand over the flash drive. "I'll trade it for the rest of us."

"What information?" she asked, eyes narrowing. No one had Seen that part.

"R-16 data," she said, and the Agent's eyes bored into hers. "You get the drive when we all leave here safely."

"I get the drive verified, you're off the grid for a week," she promised Cassie. "But I need it now to verify it."

Cassie got a flash of sidewalks spinning past her, Nick at her side running with her. "Done."

She threw the drive the Agent, who caught it deftly. She turned to one of the Agents beside her, mouth opening to give an order.

But then someone else Moved the Agents, and the elevator doors opened behind her. She frowned; she hadn't authorized more Agents on the floor with her. Only, the men in the elevator were Japanese and wielding guns aimed in front of them.

The specials hit the ground, and the Agents that saw the elevator contents hit the ground. Whoever was left standing was riddled with bullets. Nick Moved the brunette Agent against the wall, her head connecting with it with a dull thud. The drive was clutched tightly in her hand.

Cassie recognized the Japanese men as Hideki's. "Into the elevator!" she shouted, and they all rushed forward. They couldn't all fit, not with Hideki's men, and they had to go down in shifts. Cassie could only pray that they all made it safely.

***  
***


	5. Escape Route

Hideki saw them immediately as they came into the lobby. _"Baka gaijin,"_ he snarled at Cassie. "I was trying to tell you not to go yet, but you wouldn't listen!"

"We need out. And we need to get Spire back," she said, shoving him forward.

"The deal is done," he said, shaking his head. "She paid me to get you to Hong Kong."

"Fuck that," Cassie told Hideki, fear curdling in her stomach. Spire wouldn't survive the night if she went along with that plan. The future simply had to rewrite itself.

"She is with Tanaka and guarded by Takeda men," Hideki told her, shaking his head. "We will not interfere."

"Then you take me there, and I'll do it myself."

"You won't survive it."

But Cassie saw Spire on the ground, retching, red hair wild and tangled. Her arms were covered in cuts and bruises, but she was alive. She curled her lip at Hideki. "I'm braver than you, then."

"Foolish girl," he spat. "Fine."

"Who's this girl we're getting?" Nick asked, clearing his throat. He was confused. The last thing he remembered was being forced into the research facility when he tried to attack it and escape. He had traded himself for Cassie's safety, confident he could get himself back out. And then the next thing he knew, he was one of the latest lab rats hooked up to a sedative drip.

"She helped me get you out. I need to return the favor."

"Oh. Sounds good to me." He looked at Hideki brightly. "Well, you heard the girl. Get moving."

He didn't have to, but Hideki brought them to the building that contained the Takeda family holdings. "I don't know where she is in there. I will not go inside."

But Nick was already Moving the doors aside and walking into the building. Cassie followed, Spire's gun in her hand. It wasn't as heavy as she thought it would be, and supposed it was one of the modifications Spire must have done. Otherwise, it would have dragged down her coat something awful. Cassie tried to look around, tried to see where the hallways fit her prior vision with Spire. But it was like watching the stars in a new place, the constellations in different patterns than what she was used to. The walls were mostly wood and paper, to resemble an ancient Japanese estate and courtyard. Nick merely tore through them, Moving away the bullets and guns that were headed their way.

They both heard the scream at the same time, and Nick Moved everything out of their path. It seemed to originate at the end of the hallway, which had stairs leading up. Taking them two at a time, Nick got there first. Everything flew, and it seemed that the more he Moved things, the farther they went. He was burning the rest of the Versed out of his system, waking up the rest of the way. Cassie noticed that he seemed more focused, more gifted. She wondered what they had done in his absence while she was unable to See him, but couldn't put it into words.

Cassie stopped a few feet away from the landing as Nick advanced, clearing out the rest of the hallway. This doorway was familiar. This doorway sent chills down her spine.

It was unlocked, and she opened the door. Inside, Tanaka was standing over Spire. She was beaten and bloody, strapped down to a gurney. Her clothes were torn more than Cassie had Seen before, and it looked as though she had been raped. Tanaka held a knife in one hand, and had something clenched in his other fist. He was laughing at her, saying something in Japanese that Cassie couldn't understand. The knife was covered in blood, and there was blood all over Spire's face. Cassie suddenly realized that her left eye was missing, and there was a gaping hole in her skull where her eye had been, and Tanaka was turning around to smile at Cassie.

"Run!" Spire was screaming. "Goddammit, you fucking _run!"_

Cassie fired at Tanaka, and he spun around. The bullet had caught him in the shoulder, and it shattered in a spray of blood. He hit the floor, and Cassie edged into the room to untie Spire. She tumbled off of the gurney as Tanaka tried to push himself to his feet. She moved quickly, with all of her Runner reflexes at work. She snatched the knife from Tanaka, striking him in the Adam's apple with her fist. He fell back, clutching at his throat as Nick barreled into the doorway. "The fuck?" he asked, seeing Spire run the knife along Tanaka's jaw.

"I used to hate this," Spire was hissing at Tanaka. "Taka taught me well, but I refused the lessons. I guess I just needed a push in the right direction." As she talked, she cut a flap into his face, peeling back the topmost layer of skin. Tanaka screamed, trying to reach up to grab at Spire. She sliced through the tendons of his wrist without pause, then cut a flap into his other cheek. He screamed as she peeled it back slowly, carefully, exposing the musculature beneath. She sliced the pieces of skin off and shoved it into his mouth. "I just needed a _reason."_

"Spire, don't," Cassie choked, bringing her hands to her mouth. The metal of the gun was cool against her cheek, and she seized on that. She had to focus on something, or she would be ill.

"But I don't have time, do I? Like you didn't bother to take your time with me, did you?" she asked, teeth bared in a grimace, the edge of the knife on his cheekbone.

He said something after spitting out his own skin, voice high and desperate. Spire gnashed her teeth in response and cut out his eye.

Nick had been stunned immobile, but now he acted. "Cass, we gotta go. _Now."_

Tanaka howled, and Spire squeezed his eye until it burst between her fingers. "We're not even done, Tanaka," she said, voice odd and distant, face like a death mask. "I haven't even started yet."

Cassie yanked on Spire's arm. "We have to _go,_ Spire," she pleaded. She snatched up the artificial eye from Tanaka's hand. "Look, we'll find a doctor. We'll get it attached again."

"I'm not done," she said, trying to shake off Cassie.

_"Lexi,_ we have to go."

Something in her face snapped and Spire stabbed Tanaka through his damaged eye socket. Nick grabbed her other arm and hauled her out of the house sobbing. She collapsed outside, retching, shuddering, her shoulders shaking. There was nothing coming up but bile, nothing but acid and bitterness.

Nick looked up as a black town car pulled up alongside them. "Cass, it's your asshole friend again."

"Not my friend," she corrected. She dragged Spire inside the car and Nick pushed her in the rest of the way.

Hideki couldn't look at her, at the cuts and the gaping eye socket. "I'm sorry," he said slowly. "They took away your livelihood."

Spire moved quickly, snatching her gun from Cassie and cocking the trigger. "I only need one eye for this, asshole. You were fucking with me the entire time. You fucked me over royally. Tell me why I shouldn't just end it here. Tell me!"

Hideki merely stared at her, then slowly removed a small key from his coat pocket. "Our man does corrective surgery. You can be repaired."

"Fuck you. Fuck you and your entire fucking clan."

"Um... Sorry to interrupt an obviously tense moment," Nick began, shaking his head. "But who are you two?"

Cassie nodded at them. "Spire's a Runner, helped me get to you and got the stuff for the trade. Hideki's her dead ex's brother and a Yakuza boss. I think that about covers it."

"Yakuza. You freaking went to Yakuza?!" Nick cried. "They'll fucking kill us!"

"They haven't yet," Cassie told him earnestly. "Mostly because they know better." She smiled at Hideki. "Because I'm better than their pet Watcher." His jaw clenched, but he didn't refute the statement. Spire was frozen, her hands starting to tremble as she came down from the adrenaline rush and the exhaustion kicked in. "I think you need to get us all back to Hong Kong. Now, without planning anything. Your pet Watcher doesn't like you very much. I can understand why. But I'd rather not give her a chance to kill us all along with you."

His jaw clenched further, but he nodded briskly after a moment. He shouted an order to his driver as Spire slowly lowered her gun. "You're lying about the Watcher."

Cassie smiled sweetly. "Of course I'm not. I have no reason to lie in this. She hates you. You really shouldn't have killed her boyfriend and made her suck your--"

_"Cassie!"_ Nick interjected.

Hideki was outraged already. He reached over, hand raised to slap Cassie across the face. Nick held a hand up, and Hideki's hand was caught in midair. He snarled at Nick, who shook his head at Hideki. "I don't think you want to do that. I'm fairly sure we'd take exception to that."

Spire punched Hideki in the nose anyway, her face intent and fierce. "Don't touch my _mei mei."_

Cassie just shrugged and leaned back in the car, smiling. She had Nick back, and that was the most important thing. Everything else was just icing on the cake.

***

Nick and Cassie were sitting next to each other on an Omiro jet. The airport staff had been scandalized by Hideki's sudden departure, but hadn't dared to contradict him. Spire was sitting near a window, staring out of it with her good eye. She held the other tightly, and hadn't spoken to Hideki at all. "You know we're going to get screwed in this deal, right?" Nick told Cassie.

She leaned her head onto his shoulder and he threw an arm around her shoulders. She had her sketchbook in her lap and markers in hand. "I'll stop it in time," she assured him. "As long as you don't keep throwing yourself under the bus for me."

"Someone has to. You haven't got the sense of a gnat."

She chuckled and burrowed closer into his side. She had missed him more than she realized. "See? Look at this."

Nick took her notebook and tried to make sense of the drawing. "You're going to have to explain it to me," he told her apologetically. "We never did get those art lessons I promised you."

Cassie rolled her eyes and poked Nick's side. He laughed, and he felt almost bad when he saw Spire flinch several rows ahead. "This is you and me. We're in Hong Kong."

"Because it looks just like Hong Kong," Nick teased, tapping the notebook with the back of his hand. "I'd never have guessed that."

"Oh, shut up. I can't draw. You know this. Anyway, this is us in Hong Kong. If you notice, though, it's a different neighborhood than before."

"It is?" Cassie poked him again. "Ow! Stop that."

She snuggled closer, practically sitting in his lap. "Are you going to be serious about this?"

"Sure. Okay. Go right on ahead."

Cassie pointed to the signs she had drawn. It looked like the club where Midori was. "We go here for help. Spire introduced me. Sort of. I didn't See yet what we get started, but something happens right there at that club. Midori is her name, and we're going to have to cut a deal for our safety."

"That much is obvious. We're back on the grid for Division's Watchers and the Yakuza aren't going to let you go if you're better than their Watcher."

"Well, the thing is, the data on those drives are all corrupted by a virus." Nick stared at her blankly. "It has R-16 data, but there's a virus on it. It allows three tries to look at it before the drive is wiped clean. So the original drive has the one view for the copy. That new Agent will look at it once to verify what it is. When she gets to her superiors..."

"It's gone as soon as they verify what it is, too."

"Exactly."

Nick looked at the back of Spire's head in wonder. "You think she knows that?"

"She's not a hacker."

"Just guns and knives and creepy shit?" Cassie elbowed him. "Ow! What's with the abuse? You'd think you'd be throwing yourself all over me glad to have me back."

Cassie put her notebook aside and rolled over so that she was lying across Nick's chest, her face hovering right next to his, only inches apart. "I am glad," she said, her voice catching. He opened his mouth to say something, only he didn't know what to say. "I missed you, Nick. I missed you a lot. I tried to See you every day, but nothing happened until three days ago."

"They didn't change the drips exactly right, so I was halfway conscious," he told her, voice soft. He reached up and stroked her hair gently. "Hey, now. You're not going to cry, are you? I'm not worth crying over. You had to stay safe."

Cassie thought of smacking him in the chest. He was so stupid about some things. But she wound up leaning in and pressing her lips against his, her first kiss. He sucked in a breath in shock, and she just kept going. His hand tightened against her head, almost pulling her in closer. His other hand was at her back, holding her carefully. Emboldened, she tried to thrust her tongue between his slack lips like she had read in all those cheesy romance novels he used to make fun of.

Feeling her clumsy advance shocked Nick back to reality. He was ten years older than her. _Ten years._ And he'd first met her as a skinny thirteen year old with too-wise eyes, so she was more like a little sister than a love interest. Right?

Nick pushed her back, eyebrows knit. "Cassie, you can't do this."

"You're right. Too public," she said with a nod. "I've heard about the mile high club. Not ideal, but that would work."

He made a choking sound and wondered if it was possible to switch seats. Or Move her back to where she had started the flight. "Cassie!"

"You're right. I'd rather a bed and a locked door." She smiled at Nick and winked. "I'll find us a good time."

Could he sink through the seat and simply die? There had to be better fates than this one. He'd already had a few worse ones. But Cassie was just sixteen, freshly sixteen if he remembered her birthday correctly, and he was sure that he did. She was sixteen, he was ten years older than she was, and she had been like a little sister for so long that it was almost sickening to think of her as having curves and wants and _needs._

Even worse was that some part of him was responding exactly the way she wanted him to.

Cassie picked her notebook back up, as if nothing had happened. "Well, anyway. We're in Hong Kong with Midori. I'm fairly sure she'd broker a deal."

"With who?" he asked, seizing upon the safe topic. "Division or Yakuza? Or someone else?"

"She's an independent. I can't tell yet."

Cassie took up one of his hands in hers. He tightened his hand around hers without thinking. He did care for her. He just wasn't sure he should care for her _that way,_ or let her find someone her own age that didn't have a wanted sticker slapped across his back. Though, who was he kidding? She would scare away any boy her age. She knew too much and she spoke her mind. Not to mention the Watching thing. That threw any normal person for a loop.

The next drawing was vague, but Nick knew where it was. He owed the triads enough money to know all of their spots. The area was in flames, and they were running away from it, as far as he could tell. "And this?" he asked, gesturing toward the drawing.

"I think it's how we get away."

"Good. Because I don't think I want to be a pet for either camp."

***  
***


	6. Creating A Connection

Cassie and Nick pooled the contents of their pockets. Nick's were empty, of course, and Cassie had some Japanese yen and a handful of Hong Kong dollars she had forgotten to get exchanged in Tokyo. Spire merely sat at the hangar doorway, her gun and eye in her jacket pockets, her face dull and blank. Hideki was on the phone, saying something in Japanese in a low tone. "I think it's a good idea to beat it," Nick said in a soft voice. "Before they get the great idea to sell us out. Yakuza have no reason not to deal with Division. They tried it before with the syringe."

"They were in it for the money, then," Cassie told him, frowning at Spire. "I don't like how she looks. I can't See her."

"Look, you returned the favor. You said there's this person we need to get to and broker a deal..."

"I got the name through her," Cassie insisted. "You really think we should leave her there like that?"

"Well, what can we do? We don't have any means to get to your broker, let alone take her with us."

Hideki had hung up on whoever he had been speaking with and he went over to Spire's hunched form. "I may have been mistaken about you," he said roughly. "You may indeed be able to be an enforcer."

"Fuck you," she said dully, not even looking up.

"Tanaka is dead in a most impressive manner. The Takeda are looking for your friends now."

Cassie and Nick quieted, shooting each other meaningful looks. This had the potential to be very, very bad.

"Takeda have no territory here. Even yours isn't secure."

"What is it in your culture? Look at your superior when you speak to him," Hideki hissed.

"I don't see one," Spire replied, eyes still fixated on the floor. She pulled herself up to her feet using the hangar door, then finally looked at Hideki. "Taka would have been ashamed of you."

Hideki grabbed her by the hair and twisted it in his fist, sending Spire reeling. She clutched at his arm and chest for balance, and Nick had to hold Cassie back from running up there to do something stupid. "He was many things, Lexi," Hideki said, practically shaking with his tension. "He did not ever feel shame, and certainly not for family. Not for _business."_ Hideki looked up, lips curled into a snarl. "You two! Into the car. We have places to go!"

"There goes the escape plan," Nick intoned darkly to Cassie. Sometimes being the hero just plain sucked.

***

"What did you do with her?" Cassie demanded. Hideki had dragged Spire off to someone that spoke only Japanese, a guard standing in the doorway to prevent Cassie or Nick from escaping the car while he had Spire sent somewhere.

"It is no longer of your concern," Hideki snapped as he slid back into the car. He stared at them. "There is a hefty price on your heads. Division wants the both of you, the Takeda want both of you. You claim to be a better Watcher than ours," Hideki said, voice cold as he contemplated Cassie. He looked over at Nick. "And you? Are you as good as your price tag implies?"

"Maybe I'm better," he replied with a cheeky grin.

Hideki merely narrowed his eyes at them and barked a command to his driver. "You are merely lucky," he said, lip curling in distaste. "I do not favor Division or the Takeda. They do not need to know where you are just yet."

"What's the catch?" Nick asked.

Hideki leaned forward slightly. "You are aware of Gong Chen?"

The wary smile slid right off of Nick's face, and he suddenly knew what Cassie had seen. "Maybe."

"I will erase your debt to him, which is considerable, for a simple favor."

"For that much money, it's not simple."

Hideki looked at him with dead eyes. "No, it's not simple. The girl that was betrothed to my brother Takahashi defected and left for Hong Kong. I need you to find her and bring her to me."

"But he's dead," Cassie said, not understanding. "What good will that do?"

"He was jilted," Hideki said, lips compressed into a fine line. "His honor must be restored."

"Whoa. You want to kill her?" Nick asked. He wasn't going to agree to bring a girl to some stranger to be slaughtered, no matter how much money he was offered.

"She must make reparations for the dishonor she dealt my brother." Hideki leaned back in his chair. "Her death would not necessarily satisfy this."

"Then what?"

He looked uncomfortable and almost angry. "It is not necessary that you know this."

"Oh, no. It's _very_ necessary," Nick countered. "I'm not helping some stranger just kill someone."

Hideki's lips pressed into a thin line. "She was promised to my brother from the time of her birth. She flaunted the power and wealth of a Princess, then decided she would give her virginity to a _gaijin_ and steal from our house. It was because of her my brother looked elsewhere for a possible Princess."

Cassie looked at him. "Spire."

"Her name is Alexis Masters. Not her name by birth by any account I could find, but one she began using when she arrived on the streets. She went by Lexi when Takahashi first met her, then changed it when she left him to her current street name." Hideki didn't seem pleased by what he knew of her. "Mostly honorable endeavors on her part."

"So not what you need in a Princess, eh?"

"We need an asset to the family," Hideki told Nick unflinchingly. "The girl has been Shadowed ever since she ran off. But as you seem to have had success in defeating Shadows, I will eliminate your debts if you retrieve her for us."

"I haven't defeated Shadows. I've defeated _Watchers._ Big difference."

Hideki didn't seem to understand or care about the difference. The girl was easy enough to find once Cassie was drunk enough. She wasn't near a Shadow, wasn't trying to change her appearance. she had a new life and a new name, and was simply trying to live. Hideki had promised she would live; he was a complete asshole most of the time, but he was an honorable one, at least. His sense of honor was simply fucked up compared to an ordinary human being. Cassie didn't like him very much, but readily admitted it was mostly because Spire didn't. Whatever her name was, she had moved and acted without thinking, and had suffered for her contact with Cassie. What was worse, even with the alcohol blurring her filters, she couldn't See Spire. It was like picking at a wound, though. The more she Looked, the less there was to See. There was no set future for Spire, none at all.

The girl went by Eliza Yotengu and worked as a waitress in a coffee shop. It was a far cry from a Yakuza Princess. She didn't run when Nick introduced himself and Cassie. Her dead eyes looked out of a pale, worn face. "Is this the end of me?" she asked dully.

Nick shook his head. "Not if I can help it."

"He said he doesn't need you dead. But it's a question of honor for him," Cassie added.

As in her vision, Eliza gave them a bittersweet smile. "Of course. It's always honor."

They asked Hideki to meet them in a coffee shop a few blocks away from Eliza's. He met them alone as asked, his men waiting outside. His eyes widened when he took in Eliza sitting next to Cassie. "Megumi."

She nodded at Hideki. "Hideki. You are certainly a surprise."

"Why is that?"

"You waiting this long for honor to be satisfied."

"Did you think we would merely kill you?"

"Merely? Such a thing was never mere killing for Takahashi. How is he?" she asked, voice trembling slightly.

"Dead." Eliza was stunned. "Close to five years now."

"How?" she asked. "He was too good to merely die."

"Suicide mission." Two brides leaving him, imminent failure with the clans and a Watcher's warning that he served his clan better as an urnful of ashes. There was no reason for Takahashi to live.

Hideki didn't think that Takahashi was at peace. Such a thing was impossible. Takahashi didn't know what it was, didn't value it. He was an Enforcer, but Hideki often had to double back and rescue Takahashi from himself.

Eliza didn't seem surprised. "I stole nothing of true value to you..."

"The clan was affronted," Hideki interrupted. "Jewels and scrolls can be replaced. Takahashi, honor and justice cannot be replaced."

"His rage would have been great if I stayed. I am barren, Hideki. There would have been no heirs to his line, no power or honor to bestow. He would not have accepted adopted heirs."

"No, he would not have. But how did you get away? One of ours? This we must know."

"I bargained with Division. They needed more money for their Tokyo containment unit and to re-sedate their star Watcher. She told me it was safe enough to run, that both sides would be done with me. But she had her own agenda, I could tell. No one and nothing else mattered."

Cassie had grown still. _Mom!_ Nick eyed her, wishing he was sitting next to her and not Hideki. He Moved the air to ruffle her hair and squeeze her hand in support. Whatever it was between them, this uncomfortable (for him) attraction, it didn't negate the fact that he cared deeply. He probably always would, no matter what happened. Cassie flashed him a smile.

Hideki obviously wasn't pleased with Eliza. "You stole from the Omiro to help _Division!"_

"Would the Omiro have been forgiving if I knowingly came to Takahashi as a barren bride?" Hideki's glower at her was answer enough. "I allowed him to save face and take another as his Princess. Surely that is worth my life."

_"Hai,"_ Hideki agreed heavily. "Your papers were good."

"Division work as well. And I made sure to stay out of trouble."

"This is most appreciated." Hideki waved her off. "Go. You are dead to us and will remain so."

_"Arigato, Hideki-san"_ Eliza murmured. She nodded at them all, then left the coffee shop. She was not followed.

"Seems like Takahashi just couldn't catch a break," Cassie said despite Nick's warning glance. Hideki glared at her. "But now Nick's debts are canceled."

"I will take you to Midori now," Hideki said abruptly, standing.

"Where'd you take Spire?" Cassie asked, eyes narrowing.

"It is none of your concern any longer," Hideki told her shortly. "She paid for safe passage to Midori."

"Then this side jaunt to get your girl?" Nick asked, an edge to his voice. Cassie hadn't heard this often before, and it sent chills down her spine. Bad things could happen.

"To ensure safe passage, you had to obtain Omiro protection. If not, any Takeda could remove you. Now you have become part of Omiro employ and are under my protection."

"You _knew_ she wasn't important."

"There are many things not necessarily worth pursuing at the time. She was one of them. Now you may get to Midori safely."

"And Spire?"

"You are very attached to that _gaijin."_

"She calls me _mei mei."_

"That's Mandarin, not Cantonese," Nick said, confused.

"Lexi did not get a proper instructor," Hideki said, shrugging. "This is not my concern, nor is it yours. If you are _truly_ troubled, just know she is safe from Takeda for now."

Cassie was worried about that _for now._ If she wasn't useful to them as a bargaining chip, the Takeda would kill her for sure. Then again, questioning his word would only make him angry and possibly take it out on her.

"You will see her again, I am sure," Hideki added when it was apparent Cassie wasn't moving and Nick wouldn't leave without her. "She is being repaired now."

"She's not a machine," Cassie replied petulantly as she stood up. Nick followed suit. "She's a person."

"And a foolish one, at that," Hideki snapped.

The ride to Midori's was tense and silent. He took them directly to a side entrance and personally escorted them to her office.

"Omiro Hideki," Midori drawled, pleased. "Perhaps it _isn't_ enmity you feel?" She laughed at whatever he said in Japanese and nodded at Cassie and Nick. "Our fledglings are nested. I'm sure she will be pleased you are honorable, Omiro-san. I will certainly do business with you again."

Hideki left, not looking back. Cassie and Nick looked at Midori, who studied them carefully. "Lexi was most insistent in staying away from Division or any agency like them. And here she is, incapacitated. Most interesting. The two of you are very, very valuable, and very, very dangerous. Possibly unlucky. Poor Auntie Wu, and now Lexi herself." Midori's eyes narrowed. "Division wants you very, very badly. Lexi's planning stopped here, and my Shadow's limits are this room itself. Speak now. What would you do?"

"I want to take down Division and free my mother," Cassie said.

Nick was silent until Midori looked at him pointedly. "What she said. We're in this together."

Midori nodded approvingly. "I am neutral among clans, but it is also unspoken that Division tends to be bad for business. They take top talent away from us for their research and experiments. We know it's only a matter of time before they shut us down, whether with other Special people or if their synthetic tech finally works well enough to truly copy a Special. Either way, the balance as we know it will die."

"So you'll help us?" Nick asked.

Midori's smile was mercenary. "Oh, yes. I will help you. I can arrange clan and tong and triad to help you. I maintain balance in Hong Kong, and this will not occur until Division ceases to be a spectre for us."

Cassie looked at Nick. "Got a plan?"

He shrugged. "Depends on the kind of help we can get." He looked at Midori and gave her a charming smile. "I can do the planning, but we're short on the manpower."

Her mercenary smile was chilling. "I'll get you manpower and firepower. Whoever you need, I have access."

Nick smiled. "We know Mimotech is the main front company, and they have the government-approved locations. We know where most of them are. To truly stop Division, though, we'll have to take it all down at once, erase every database and free every Special in it. Simultaneously."

"This indeed takes manpower. And coordination."

Nick nodded. "So we would certainly be in your debt."

Midori smiled and chuckled softly. "My boy, our entire world would be in your debt. I like you, as I've liked Lexi and by extension her quiet girl there. So I will indeed find you the manpower and Shadow guard that you need for this task." She said something to a compatriot in the room, who bowed and exited via a side door. "When my subordinate returns, go with Sakura and plan. She is a Shadow of enough talent to keep you safe while you plan a strategy. Heed her limits and don't escape the safe house without her, or there is no point to subterfuge."

Cassie and Nick both nodded. "Of course."

Sakura was a slight and petite girl of Chinese and Japanese descent who realized she was a shadow early on. She could help people evade security cameras, teams, guns and lasers. She spoke in softly accented English, and seemed to be continually on alert.

The safe house was in a section of neighborhood Nick was familiar with but Cassie wasn't. "Stay on this floor," she told them with a grim tone. "Share a bedroom and bathroom. Otherwise, you _will_ get caught."

Nick sighed. Share a room. With Cassie. Who had a crush on him and who was now officially the Hong Kong age of consent. Who he cared about a little too much and wasn't family. Who he really wanted to protect, maybe from himself as well.

Cassie merely grinned at him before stomping into the room.

Avoiding Sakura's level stare, he followed Cassie into the bedroom and shut the door. There was only so long they could rely on a Shadow. If Division already opened that flash drive two times, their anger would come at them hard. Nick didn't want to contemplate what their fates would be if Division got a hold of them.

Cassie had taken off all of her outer layers and kicked off her boots. There was a single bed, of course, and an adjoining bathroom. Cassie was sprawled across the bed, grinning like a loon at Nick.

He sat at the desk in the room and looked at the blank pad of paper and pens. Mimotech and Division had to be obliterated at once. He didn't want to be left out and knew Cassie wouldn't, either. Plus, there was her mother. The closest they had gotten was once in Shanghai, but the Agent replacing Carver must have been toying with them. Cassie's mother hadn't been there. The Agent had claimed that she set Cassie's mother free, that she had been out and about, but Cassie and Nick had never seen her.

"I think we'd want to be part of this takedown," he told her, ignoring her pointed stare. "I'm not sure if your Mom had been moved again, but it looked like she was in the Seattle branch of Mimotech."

Cassie stopped pouting at Nick's obvious reluctance to sit next to her on the bed. "You think so?"

"I got that from their computers before I was caught. Maybe they didn't move her. There's no need to if I was used as a guinea pig. They probably think they fried my brain up, nice and crispy."

"Don't say that," Cassie whispered. She got up and went to his side. "I don't know what I'd do without you, Nick," she whispered.

"Same thing you were doing before me, I'm sure," he said, uncomfortable with her closeness. She was still only sixteen, even if his body screamed she was plenty old enough to know what she wanted.

"I've been out there since I was seven," Cassie told him in a quiet voice. "My mother gave me to some Agent I didn't know and told him to hide me somewhere Division wouldn't find me. She didn't want me used against her." Cassie sat down in Nick's lap and curled up around him. Nick wrapped his arms around her almost instinctively. "I've been alone for a long time, Nick, and I don't want that ever again."

"So I'm convenient?"

Her laughter had a strange edge to it. "That's the last word I'd ever use to describe you. It's _not_ convenient at all. But this is there, whatever this is. And I can't lose you."

Nick closed his eyes and simply cradled her in his arms. He tried not to enjoy the feel of her there. "Well, that's two of us, then. But... I'm ten years older than you. I'm a creepy, dirty old man."

Cassie looked up at him, knowledge in her eyes. "Do you really see me as just sixteen?"

No. Yes. No.

While Nick warred with himself to answer, Cassie leaned in and kissed him again. He responded without thinking, arms tight around her and his tongue sliding into her mouth. She grasped his shirt tight for balance, a soft moan escaping her. That was enough to shock him back to reality, enough to make him break the kiss. However mature she was, however much he wanted this, she was still sixteen, still off limits.

"I can wait," Cassie whispered, hands still fisted around his shirt. "As long as we're together, I can still wait."

"Still?" he echoed dumbly.

"This has been a long time coming, Nick," she told him, voice gentle. "I've loved you a long time. I think I always have, before I understood what I Saw. I can wait if I have to."

Almost ashamed, Nick cupped her face in his hands. "Are you sure? Don't waste your life on me."

She kissed him, looping her arms around his neck. "I'm sure. I've Seen it."

He ran his fingers through her hair, tugging at the snarls and tangles. "You haven't lived enough."

"I've Seen more than I should. I have to understand more than I should. My mental age is a lot higher than my chronological age."

That was true, and possibly the only reason why Nick was even contemplating this.

"I can wait, Nick," Cassie assured him. "You're worth it."

He didn't think so, but kept his mouth shut.

Cassie kissed him again, soft and slow, still a little hesitant and definitely still untutored. Nick touched his tongue to her lips and her mouth opened under his. It was probably a thousand shades of wrong, but it _felt_ right.

"You should rest," he told her when he broke the kiss. "You rest and I'll start making plans. We'll need to let Midori know who's involved and then get ourselves to Seattle somehow."

"You'll figure it out." Cassie climbed down off of his lap and then tucked herself into bed to sleep for a while. Maybe she would See something to help them.

Nick, in the meantime, had lots of planning to do.

***  
***


	7. Wheels In Motion

With the safe house in a hotel, Nick had a wealth of stationery with which to plot. He knew vaguely how many Mimotech sites there were, though specifics were a little beyond him. As a result, he had to keep his directions a little more vague than he liked; this kept too many variables in play, but might wind up confusing Watchers. If there was too much to See, the picture was too blurred to draw properly.

Midori was amused by the stack of envelopes to give the proper agents. The main Mimotech sites were in Shanghai, Beijing, Tokyo, Sydney, Manila, Seattle and San Francisco. Smaller sites might still hold a few Specials or research, but they were overflow satellites of the larger sites. Once there were openings in the main sites, subjects were filtered back there. Nick was hoping they would implode once the main sites were taken out, though additional instructions were given if the teams truly wanted the additional work.

"We want in on the Seattle site," Nick told Midori. "We don't have to be in charge, but we want to be there."

"The girl's mother?" Midori asked quietly.

Cassie nodded, unable to speak. She was close, she could feel it. It could really work this time.

"Well, the problem would be in getting you to Seattle, of course. Lexi is in recovery now and quite unable to help either of you, given she'd been there before." Midori tapped her cheek as she thought carefully. "I know of your troubles with the locals, Nicholas Gant. You will unfortunately have to deal with them and risk exposure of the plan you erected."

"If there was a Wiper..."

Midori smiled. "Yes, I have one of those. I have a great many wonderfully talented people at my disposal. I suppose that is the secret to defeating Division's Watchers?" she asked, curious.

"It worked once," Nick told her with a shrug. "You can't plan for everything, but the basics are in place, then. Everything else is up to the talent you lined up."

"Ah, Mr. Gant, you wholly underestimate my role in this city. Why do you think there are relatively few turf wars here among the tongs and triads?"

"You said you're neutral..."

"Neutral but not disinterested. Balance is a tricky thing, but my expertise in this matter is respected."

"You're a formidable ally," Nick told her.

Midori softened a fraction under the flattery. "Quite the charmer, Mr. Gant. You are worth knowing."

Nick bowed and grinned. "Hopefully in a good way."

Her smile was sharp and full of teeth. "Very good. You would see so if you did not have a companion already. I am many things," she said with a wry chuckle, "but a homewrecker I am not. We'll get the Wiper and begin."

Cassie smirked at Nick after the homewrecker comment. She was going to be downright insufferable about it. Good thing he was about to forget all about the comment.

***

Nick had and odd, vague feeling throughout the flight to Seattle. He was forgetting something important. He knew he had asked for a mind wipe, but something else important nagged at him. _I missed something,_ he couldn't help but think. _Hopefully it doesn't destroy us._

Cassie sat beside him on the flight, her hand clutched tightly in his. They were returning to the United States after so many years abroad, and they were going to finish Division.

"You'll be okay," Nick told her softly. They were nestled in a coach flight as Theo Carver and Kimberly Masters. The irony of Nick's name choice wasn't lost on him.

Cassie had remembered the name of Spire's forger, and Nick knew of him by reputation. They had managed to get his new passport under Sakura's watchful eye, then the Wiper had shown up. By the time they left for the airport, Nick didn't know why they were going to the airport at all. This method also freed up Sakura to accompany others on the way to their locations.

Still, there was that drawing of the two of them running from a blaze in Hong Kong. It still hadn't happened yet. Or maybe they had changed things enough that it would no longer happen. The future was tricky that way.

_The very act of observing a system tends to disturb it,_ her mother had told her before sending her away. _Be very careful about what you See. Choose wisely._

She had never been a child, not like others. She had always known too much, feared too much.

Cassie felt safe around Nick. She wasn't alone, didn't have to be so wise-alecky or afraid. She didn't always have to be running. It was more than that, though. It was the way he smiled at her, the way he laughed at her bad jokes and poor drawing skills, the way he could make her feel so cherished and special with just a touch. Maybe he was afraid of what that meant, but she wasn't. She had been waiting for a long time to feel safe, and he was the only one she felt safe with.

"Do you think this time we'll find her?" she asked in a small voice, almost afraid of the answer.

"You didn't See that we didn't, right?" Cassie nodded. She hadn't Seen much of anything, actually. "So that means it's not set yet. It means _their_ Watcher can't See anything either, so they can't stop us. So I'm sure we'll find her."

He was an endless optimist sometimes.

***

Seattle's airport was large and easy to get lost in. If anyone was starting to follow them, it was difficult to tell. With no baggage, they easily breezed out into the city. Cassie held onto Nick's hand tightly. They looked like any other couple on a jaunt in downtown Seattle, getting a coffee and chatting with each other in whispers. Their heads were bent close to each other as they talked, looking for all the world as they were the only things existing for each other. They did all but kiss, the way they were clearly wrapped up in each other.

"There they are," Nick murmured, eying a group of Asian businessmen entering the coffee shop.

And suddenly the lovestruck-looking couple were all business, ready for the seven men filing into the shop to meet them.

Nick had known that the Tokyo and Seattle sites would be even more strongly defended sites, considering the prior attacks. Tokyo might not have moved in subjects from their satellite location yet, but Cassie hadn't touched their data banks when she rescued Nick. It was now three days since then, maybe less than a week since Cassie first Saw Nick in a vision.

Both Tokyo and Seattle needed highly offensive personnel. Movers, Pushers, Screamers or Bleeders would be necessary, and it would have to be lethal force. Any gunfire backup was a bonus, and also had to be aware that lethal force was needed. The Pop family had brought twenty to thirty gunners to face off against Agent Carver, Victor, Kira and four other armed agents. They had lost every man. Nick wasn't under the illusion that the main holdings would be poorly defended at baseline, much less at heightened alert.

One of the Asian men spoke up, and he had a distinctly British accent. "So this plan of yours... You believe it will work?"

"To mess up Division's plans? Definitely. Maybe even shut them down for good. But us... I make no guarantee on our lives. I _hope_ we make it. I _want_ to make it. But there's too much left to chance on this for me to say yes."

He nodded. "I like that you don't lie to me," he said, checking his watch casually. "We've had to import many men for this. Most of the local talent was exterminated or otherwise incapacitated almost two years ago. It's made some sour on Division's presence. Most were willing to work for nothing up front, just for the pleasure in inflicting damage."

"The Mimotech building here is _only_ theirs, so there won't be any collateral damage," Nick told him.

"Yes, we are aware. We've scouted location and installed sniper backup. More will be imported as the need arises."

Cassie caught a glimpse of black outfits and complex guns on the Mimotech roof. "They have them, too." The firefight would be absolutely lethal.

He flicked her a glance. "Watcher?" Cassie nodded. "Ah. This is good. There's no local Watching talent left. The last one died in the Mimotech building. I will call for more reinforcements."

One of the other men said something, and Nick and Cassie assumed it to be Japanese. The lead speaker nodded. "Darkness will be our best option. Fewer clerks, more of those dedicated to the actual task of experimenting on our own."

"We have to do this as a concerted effort with the other sites," Nick disagreed. "Otherwise, they'll have even more reinforcements. They _can't_ know what the plan is."

He patted his jacket pocket. "I haven't opened the directions and I haven't told you my name."

"They'll See you. We're planning _something,"_ Nick said firmly. "We _can't_ believe this will be easy."

The man looked at him with a touch more respect. "So you're the tactician?"

"Maybe. But I'm not so good I'm taking anything for granted in this. It's dangerous and deadly."

The man smiled grimly. "As are most things in our profession. These are the choices we make."

"You're being awfully understanding about this," Cassie murmured. "Thank you."

The man's grin froze in place. "My sister was a Stitch. _Was,_ because they took her and _broke_ her to take apart and study her abilities. She was good enough to care for us, but not worth keeping alive to them. They put all of you on a scale, and my sister ranked below the cut off."

"How do you know this?" Nick asked, concerned.

"We tortured it out of the Agent that captured her. Unfortunately, it was too late to do anyone any good." He rose and nodded at them. "We will house you somewhere safe for the next few hours. Then we'll retrieve you to begin."

The safe house was a dive in a questionable part of town. Once inside the doors, however, there were high tech security devices, cameras and sensors. These men were very serious about safety, and seemed to have taken the time and effort to reinforce the entire building. It simply _looked_ ready to fall apart on the outside.

Cassie looked around the room, letting the random images in her mind slide past her. Nick sprawled across the bed, bone tired but unable to sleep. "I hope this works. It's all we got at this point."

Cassie sat down beside his sprawled form and rested a hand on his chest. She knew he wouldn't remember their last conversation, that it probably had been wiped along with the plans he had made in nested envelopes. He started at her touch, his mouth opening to protest. "We had this conversation already, but it got wiped."

Nick's mouth clamped shut for a moment. "And what did we say?"

Her mouth quirked. "Can I say you're okay with it?"

"Probably not, Cassie," he told her with an answering grin. "Good try, though."

Cassie stretched out beside him, curling up into his warmth. "I can wait until you're ready for me."

"Isn't that usually the guy's line?" he quipped.

"Yeah, but you're too honorable to just take what's being offered here," Cassie replied with a laugh. "But I can wait."

There was a vague sense of remembrance, a vague sense that this had all happened before. It was familiar, even if the actual memory was gone. The Wiper Midori used obviously wasn't as good as the one he'd used before.

Nick had an arm around Cassie, keeping her close. "Are you _sure?_ I don't want you to regret this."

"I don't regret a thing," Cassie whispered, tucking her head against his chest. His heartbeat was strong and steady, the backbeat to many future memories of him. "This is where I belong. This is where I'm supposed to be. With you."

_I'm not that special,_ he wanted to say. But it wasn't about being Special or even an ordinary kind of special. It was about Cassie's feelings for him, and the tangled feelings he had for her. She was getting too old for the age barrier to be a valid excuse for himself. She knew him too well for him to bullshit her. But he almost didn't want to, almost wanted to simply cave in. He could roll over, kiss her like he wanted to and Cassie would love every moment of it and demand more.

"I don't know when later will be."

"I don't either," Cassie replied. "I'm okay with that."

Nick supposed he could be, too.

***  
***


	8. Plan Of Action

Mimotech looked like any other big business building in downtown Seattle's business district. There didn't appear to be any extra security guards at the front gate, and the average person passing by wouldn't think to look up. On the roof was a tactical team waiting to snipe anyone foolish enough to simply walk in. On the individual floors that were devoted to Division research and not civilian retail were more strike teams. They had heavy duty armor and high velocity rounds. They were equipped for battle and ready to kill.

Nick's team had no intention of playing fair.

The outer envelope had carried instructions for the two sniper teams assembled. They would take out the rooftop teams and make it seem a frontal assault was imminent. A heavily armored car would crash into the front of the building, just for versimilitude.

The inner envelope was for the the inner strike teams. They were entering the basement via the sewer access, and took service elevators up to the appropriate floors. High skilled Movers were up front, along with a Screamer. They would Move bullets away from as the Screamer did his job to incapacitate the strike teams. There was a Runner capable of getting to all of the room access panels and unlocking them before the second team arrived. The Runner then also had to unhook anyone hooked in as Nick had been and get them to the service elevator. Below, another Runner was waiting for the rescued people and had to get them to a safe house to recover. That transport team was made up of ordinary gunmen ready to shoot if necessary.

When they found the actual archives, a copy could be made, much like Spire's ill-fated attack, or it could simply be destroyed. For most teams, it would be easier to destroy the archives. Someone would eventually have to worry later about any potential Division backlash. The government agencies would be too busy blaming someone and trying to barter with other countries to care right away. It would give them time to coordinate a similar strike against Europe, which was much more coordinated.

Nick didn't plan to leave _any_ agency like Division left on the map. They would all be destroyed.

It began much like the way Nick planned. The two sniper teams battled it out on the rooftop as an armored car ran through the plate glass lobby walls. They drove straight through the empty reception desk and into the main elevator banks, destroying it.

Nick and the others were on the service elevator as the attack rocked the building. Armed teams on the floors above moved into position. The Movers stopped the bullets, and Nick Moved them right back at the armed guards as the Screamer did his thing. It was easy to do, so easy, and he wondered why he had never truly _played_ with his ability before.

Cassie tugged on his arm. "The plan!" she hissed, and it snapped him back to the present.

If it hadn't worked, he would have rushed ahead, would have played into Division's hands. It would have meant his death, as the others would never have bargained for his life.

Nick fell back into line and they advanced down the hall. There were two Runners, which split the escape time in half, even for them. It was one on each side of the hall, ripping open doors and leads and restraints, carrying them to the elevator that had been blocked open to prevent it from going anywhere Mimotech men could use it.

They reached the end of the hall. One Runner went down the service elevator and the other followed them a flight up to do it all again.

_It can't be this easy,_ Nick thought, amazed. _It really_ can't_ be this easy!_

Carver's replacement was up ahead. There was the complication he had almost expected. The Asian man handed him an envelope with his name on it. Startled, Nick opened it.

_Cassie's mother is under tight security and is guarded by Agents at all times. Cassie's birthday is the code. Kill everyone else._

He looked up as he shoved the note in his pocket. "Let's go. Kill them all."

The Screamer let loose before the Agent or her men could even react. Some tried to shoot wildly toward them. The two Movers held the bullets in place, and Nick added a push to unsettle those gunmen still standing despite the fact that their eardrums had burst and their balance was gone.

The Agent looked on in disbelief as Nick strode forward. She tried to push herself back up, tried to level a gun at Nick. He glared at her and Moved her up to eye level. "Did you enjoy hunting us?" he seethed. "Did you enjoy locking us up and killing us?"

"You have to be contained," she gasped. She was reaching for a holdout weapon as she gasped for air.

Nick didn't even need Cassie's warning cry. He flung her across the hallway, where she landed with a dull thud. She didn't move after that.

"Do you think she's dead?" Cassie asked, stunned.

"I hope so. If not, she'll be really pissed at us when she wakes up," Nick replied. He inputted Cassie's birth date into the coded lock and the door slid right open.

Cassie pushed the door open and entered the room. Other were looking for research computers, the databases, something. Cassie didn't care about any of that. Lying on the bed in front of her, tied down with drips and drugs and restraints, was her mother.

Cassie gasped and struggled with the buckles. Her fingers felt numb and the leather couldn't bend under them. Nick was there, helping her, untying her mother and pulling the drips out that kept her mother sedated enough to continually Watch and dream of the future.

"Mom?" Cassie asked, voice cracking. "Mom?"

"Give it a minute to clear," Nick told her, helping to lift up her mother. "C'mon. Let's get out of here."

Cassie had a flash of auburn on the roof; while she didn't know what it meant, the feeling the sight generated was one of relief.

Nick hauled Cassie's mother up out of the bed and slung her arm over his shoulder. Cassie grasped her mother about the waist and dragged her along with Nick. Her mother was dead weight, but breathing and _real._ This was her mother, after nine _years_ of trying and waiting. Cassie finally had Elizabeth Holmes.

The service elevator was out. The other men were running down stairs, but Cassie shook her head. There was no way they could drag Elizabeth down the stairs in her condition. "Main elevator bank," Nick murmured, nodding toward it. "I'll Move us down."

"You can do that?"

"I can do a lot if I put my mind to it," he replied as they began to move toward the front elevators. Neither wanted to talk about the fact that he had been in Division hands, sedated and had their various drugs tested on him. It hadn't been R-16 since that data had been lost, but it had been something like it. Nick's powers were magnified now, even without much practice.

Cassie didn't want to think what he was capable of once he actually tried to focus and practice.

It was like standing in the middle of a cloud, and Cassie kept her eyes fixed on Nick's and Elizabeth's faces. She didn't dare to look down below her feet, at the empty space there. She didn't dare disturb Nick's concentration. They landed over the elevator cars with a jolt. It started Elizabeth, and her eyes opened. "Cassie," she mumbled. "Too much left to do..."

"Mom," Cassie gasped, trying to hold her weight. Nick Moved the elevator hatch open, then dropped down first. Cassie helped maneuver her mother to the opening, and Nick helped to Move her down and then Cassie. The armored car was up ahead, doors open. The team that had been inside it lay sprawled dead on the floor, other Mimotech security guards lying dead nearby as well. Three Mimotech guards remained, guns aimed right at the open elevator doors where the three of them stood.

"Last chance to run," Nick told them, voice hard.

One cocked his gun. "Turn over the Watcher."

His grin was feral. "Never."

A blast wave of air rippled out around Nick and flew forward at high speed. It was just like the wave he had seen his father do when he was a child, when the other Agents had found them.

The three guards flew back, out of the building, guns flying. There was no one else left standing in the Mimotech building's lobby.

The others were fleeing, disappearing into the night. Nick and Cassie hadn't stuck to the carefully laid plan at the last minute. There was no ride out for them now.

"Now what?" Cassie asked as her mother groaned, waking.

"We've got wheels," Nick replied, nodding at the armored car. "Let's get out of here."

Elizabeth was laid out across the back seat and Nick and Cassie climbed into the front. Nick was glad to see that the car engine turned over. He threw the car into reverse and drove out of the building. He ran over one of the three surviving guards, and saw the other two pushing themselves up to their feet. "Get ready to duck..."

But shots rang out overhead, and both med dropped in the blink of an eye. Cassie looked out of the car window, catching a flash of auburn hair over the rooftop across from the Mimotech building.

With nowhere to go, Nick simply drove out into the night aimlessly. There was no plan in mind, nothing to tie them down for a location.

Elizabeth stirred by the time the tank hit the halfway mark. "Mom!" Cassie cried happily, turning around in her seat. "You're awake."

She took in her surroundings, nodding. She gave an address to Nick in sharp tones, not even looking at Cassie. Nick felt her glare against the back of his skull and hurried to double back. He had passed by that address minutes before.

"Mom," Cassie began softly, hurt. "It's been so long..."

"We still have work to do. Europe's outposts are still operational, and they still have most of their research intact thanks to those sites."

Nick eyed Elizabeth warily through the rearview mirror. "Yeah, well, we know what's next. We don't have the manpower for it yet..."

"Midori and the Omiro will help with Russia," Elizabeth replied dismissively. "I've laid groundwork in Italy and Germany twenty years ago, almost." She smiled thinly at both of them. "You have no idea how long I've been planning this, timing escapes and players just so, leading up to this."

Cassie's heart clenched at the tone of voice her mother used. It wasn't that different from an Agent's voice. "And us?"

"You get to rest now," Elizabeth said, her tone softening a fraction. "You've done enough for now. Anything more will upset the system I have in place." She reached out and ruffled Cassie's hair as she had back when Cassie was seven, when she had told an Agent to take Cassie away. "You've earned the rest, Cassie. You've done enough for the plans I've made. Let another do them now. Take your happiness while you can."

"But we broke you out so we could be together," Cassie protested as Nick pulled up at the address. "It's been _nine years,_ Mom!"

Elizabeth looked almost pained for a moment. "Cassie, you broke me out so this can be finished. Division must be taken down. It's a hydra. Unless all the heads are burned off, more will sprout in place."

"You're my mother!" Cassie yelled as Elizabeth got out of the car. She scrabbled at her seat belt to follow her out. "You can't just leave me!"

Nick followed suit, arms crossed over his chest as he took in Elizabeth. "Lady, this is your _daughter._ You have no idea what she's been through just to get you here."

"Your biological father brought you to a safe place and took you off their subject list," Elizabeth told Cassie with a shrug. "That was the best I could do." She clasped Cassie's face in her hands. "I was an Agent. I was good at it until we were betrayed. I'm not who you want me to be, Cassie."

"My father gave up everything to protect me," Nick snapped, seeing Cassie's eyes begin to fill with tears. "That's what parents _do_."

"I'm not who you want me to be. I can't be, even if I tried. I'm a soldier, and the war isn't over yet."

"Bullshit," Nick hissed. He only just managed not to grab Elizabeth and shake her for making Cassie cry.

"I'm giving you this chance to get out, to live a real life. You'll never get that with me," Elizabeth told Cassie quietly. Their eyes locked, and Nick wanted to punch Elizabeth. She was hurting Cassie for the sake of her precious plan, for revenge, and she didn't seem to care at all. Cassie had moved heaven and earth to get him back, so they could get Elizabeth out, and she didn't seem grateful at all.

"But we can be a family again, I know we can. I'll fix it, whatever it is..." Cassie pleaded.

"I'm your mother," Elizabeth said firmly, shaking her head sadly. "But I can't be the kind of mother you want. Go on, get out of here before Agents come. They'll find us soon enough, you know this." Elizabeth met Nick's angry gaze. "Take care of her."

He was the last one she should be entrusting her daughter to. He was the last one that should be caring for her. "You're her _mother,"_ Nick spat, venom in his voice. "That's your job."

"If I stay, we all die," Elizabeth told them evenly. "There is no chance of any of us surviving this." She looked at Cassie as if Cassie was another Agent to deal with. "You know how it is, Cassie."

She knew it was true as her mother said it, but couldn't help it. Nine years of hoping and waiting and dreaming... Every dream she'd had for the past nine years died a screaming death. "Maybe I can See something you missed. We have Nick. He's good at Moving, he'll help us..."

"Cassie," Elizabeth said firmly, interrupting her. "You're too old for that now. You know how this works." She looked out past them, at the dark and deserted streets. "There isn't enough time for this."

"You will _make_ the time," Nick bristled, grabbing Elizabeth's arm. The woman was weak, nearly wobbling as he grabbed her, and Cassie pushed her hands over her mouth as the tears kept streaming down her face. "Your daughter is worth that much. She's worth more than this bullshit you're throwing at her. She's worth your effort to be here."

Elizabeth merely looked at Cassie with a sad expression. It looked like the canned sympathy someone would give a stranger when told about a relative dying. "I'm sorry, Cassie, I really am. But I can't go with you."

Nick shook Elizabeth roughly, and Cassie reached out to grab his arm with shaking fingers. "Let her go," Cassie whispered hoarsely. "Nick, it's all right. I get it. Just let her go."

Cassie stood there and watched numbly as her mother walked into the building and shut the door. At the click, Cassie ran forward to pull on the door. It was locked, and Nick didn't think Cassie would appreciate him Moving it off its hinges. He pulled her into a tight embrace, tucking her against his chest. "You've still got me, Cassie, whatever that's worth."

"Yeah," Cassie said as she looked up, tears streaming.

Nick pulled her into the car and buckled her in. He ran around and threw the car into drive. He didn't know where he was going as he drove and didn't care. He simply didn't want to be anywhere near Elizabeth Holmes. Cassie wouldn't appreciate him planting his fist in the woman's face if he ever saw her again.

The thoughts circled her mind, and she picked at it like a sore tooth. "Why doesn't she care? Why doesn't she love me enough to stay?"

"Maybe this is the only way she can think of to keep you safe," he hedged, though he didn't believe it himself. His father had given his last breath to protect him. That was a parent's job. That was taking care of somebody. It wasn't caring about the mission more than the people involved. It couldn't be. "My dad told me to run and lay low, and died trying to protect me. Maybe this is the only way. She's a Watcher, Cassie. You know what that means better than anyone."

"Stop being so reasonable," she said irritably, not looking at him.

Nick saw signs for the airport and headed that way. They might as well return to Hong Kong, where their allies were. He grasped her leg tightly, before he could stop himself or remind himself that he was ten years older than her. "I'm staying with you, Cassie. You're not getting rid of me that easily. I'll make it up to you."

She dropped her hand over his and gave him a watery smile. "That's good."

"Ready to get back on a plane?" Nick asked quietly as they got to the airport.

"No. But I'm starting to hate this city."

Nick nodded in agreement. "Let's go home."

***

They walked into the bar some weeks later and an auburn-haired woman with brown eyes was behind the counter pouring drinks. "You should come with a warning label," she said dryly as they sat down across from her. "Never thought I'd wind up looking ordinary again."

She was trying to joke about it, but Cassie still felt badly for her. "You were in Seattle, weren't you, Lexi?"

Lexi smiled sadly. "Yeah. Didn't even get the muscle control fully down yet when I hopped on a plane. I had to use a scope for the first time in years. That was awkward. Bad memories all around, anyway. I wound up coming back here, after all."

"Stories are that Spire died in Tokyo," Nick told her.

"Well, she was known for her crazy red hair," Lexi murmured. "And the Takeda would have wanted to kill her if she was still alive." She wiped down the bar in front of them. "What can I get you both, then?"

"Beers," Nick replied with a shrug. "Something simple."

"It's good that some things still are," she agreed with a smile. It was tinged with sadness; a terrible kind of knowledge had put it there, and endless nights of nightmares.

Cassie had Seen a vision of Hideki arguing with his father after his wife was murdered in his place by an assassin. He already had his heirs, and didn't approve of his father assigning him a new Princess. "You might as well assign me a barren bride," Hideki told his father. "I won't touch her, and I don't have to."

"That _gaijin_ is damaged and wholly inappropriate," his father sniffed. "I'll never accept her."

"She won't be recognized officially," Hideki had said with a shrug. "But she has eyes and ears regarding the world that can inform us better than any replacement Princess you may assign me."

This vision didn't disappear upon seeing Lexi. She had a future now.

Cassie smiled at Lexi. "You'll be all right."

Lexi seemed touched by the comment. "Sometimes it works out. Not always as you planned it, but it works out."

"So everything works the same?" Nick asked, frowning at her. When he had first seen her, Lexi had an empty eye socket and an artificial eye in her fist. This girl looked different from that broken one.

"More or less," she said with a sad smile. "Hideki wasn't as big a dick as I thought he was."

"Anything there?" Nick asked playfully as the beers arrived.

Lexi snorted. "Hardly. Asshole's married with three kids. No thank you. I'm just fine as I am."

"Well, you've got us," Cassie told her brightly, sipping the beer. No need to say anything to Lexi. That future was far enough away that the strain between them would fade. And maybe by then, the sting of being left behind by her mother would fade, too.

"So when's the wedding?" Lexi asked with a grin. "I could use some good news about now."

"Well, no wedding yet. But we're hanging out locally." Nick took a large drink from his beer. "We're under the radar. Maybe even go legit."

Lexi snickered. "I'm sure Chen could use a stock boy."

Nick wrinkled his nose as Cassie laughed. Lexi moved off to take care of a new customer. "You're okay?" he asked quietly. "I know you were worried about her..."

"She's okay," Cassie replied with a ready smile. It calmed him. "I just wanted to be sure. It was my fault for getting her mixed up in this."

Nick took her hand in his. "So we're good?"

Cassie's grin at him was wide and happy. "We're great."

Someday, maybe her mother's war would end and she'd come back to Cassie, so they could figure out how to be a mother and daughter again. In the meantime, she had to be content with knowing her mother was alive and out there somewhere, out of Division's hands. She didn't know all of the stars overhead or the language or even half of the people around her. But she did have Nick, and they were safe.

That alone made this home.

 

The End.


End file.
